Ravensong
by LinneaPike
Summary: My life was plain. I was a nobody. It wasn't always easy, but it was simple enough. My life became anything but simple the minute I met Finnick Odair. R&R!
1. Waking up

**Hey, this is the first chapter of my story, I hope you all like it. Just so you know, I'm sorry if the first two chapters are a little slow, I just wanted to introduce all of the charecters before I jump right into the story, so bear with me! Either way, heeeeere we goooo!**

* * *

Raven

* * *

Ravenclaw Carlyle woke up to the sound of her mother's fists rapping against her bedroom door,

"Up! Up! I swear to god, if I have to come in there…Get up, child!" Raven snapped her eyes open and sat up on her bed. Once she realised where the noise was coming from, she sighed. As much as she wished it wasn't, this was generally how she woke up in the morning. So Raven rolled herself out of bed and dressed as quickly as she could, because she knew that if her mother had to come back, her fists wouldn't be hitting the door.

Once she was dressed she left her room for the bathroom to brush her hair and teeth. She looked at herself in the mirror, and her blonde hair was in tangles all the way down to her waist, so she brushed it out until it fell evenly again. She looked at her face and it was pale. However her face was always pale. Much unlike other girls in her District, Raven's hair (ironically) was long and blond, while other girls in her District had either auburn or occasionally black hair. Her father had always told her it must have been a trait that belonged to someone higher up in her family tree, because neither of her grandparents on either side of the family had it. Her eyes were dark, almost completely black. She often found it made her look rather devilish, not that she considered herself a bad kid, however. So when she was finished with the basics she headed out to the kitchen to prepare breakfast for herself and her mother.

She entered into their small living room/ kitchen, and quickly busied herself making breakfast. She began clearing away the beer bottles that had been left on the counter from last night, and probably some from the night before too. She hated how her mother drank. It was sad, because not once in her life could she remember a time when she was sober, and if she wasn't drunk, she was hung over and cranky.

She moved over to the fridge to get some bacon and some eggs, only to find out that they were out of bacon. So she decided that eggs and toast would have to do. She began frying some eggs in the pan, and while she was at it, made 5 slices of toast. As she busied herself in the kitchen, her mother sat on the couch on the other side of the round wooden table they ate at watching television. A loud laugh, almost like a bark, came out of her as she sat in front of the television. Raven was never allowed to watch. Raven stayed quite, but not long afterwards a smash came from over where her mother sat. She had broken another beer bottle. It didn't take long for her mother to start shouting,

"Welllll", she slurred, "what are ya waitin fur stupid! Come pick it up!"

"Yes, Mom." She replied quietly. Her mother then stood up and stumbled towards the table,

"Hurry upp with breakfast, stupid kid…" she mumbled as she sat herself down into a chair. Raven tried not to look at her mother very often, but she could imagine her mother's overweight figure plopping itself down onto a chair while her dark auburn hair bounced around on her head and her green eyes watched the table hazily. Raven was so glad she looked nothing like her mother. She dumped the eggs onto a plate and set it on the table, then did the same with the toast. Before she sat down to eat, she grabbed the broom from the closet behind the door and swept up her mother's broken beer bottle, disappointment welling up inside of her with every sweep. When she was done, she dumped the shards in the garbage can, and put the broom back in its place. She then sat down at the table to eat her breakfast.

"Did ya clean it upp?

"Yes."

"Did you put the broom back?"

"Yes"

"Good…" And they ate the rest of their meal in silence. Ravens mother finished first, and stumbled out the back door, probably to continue drinking from the cooler her mother leaves out there. She doesn't go into town, because shop owners won't deal with her (except for the guy who runs the liquor store, he loves her), so she sends Raven to do everything for her. She quietly began to clean up the dishes, and as she did so she thought about her father.

Raven's father worked for the Capitol; however she never did understand what it was he did. He was never around during the year, and they really didn't keep in touch (his job wouldn't allow it). He only ever came home at Christmas; to what he thought was a loving family. Every year before he would come home for the holidays, Ravens mother would go crazy and make the house clean and would try to stay sober enough so that he wouldn't notice. It wasn't difficult, considering he was only home for five days. Even though she hardly saw her father, she loved him more than anything and liked to keep a countdown in her head until how long it would be until he came home. After that he left for the rest of the year. All she knew about his job was the name that was carefully printed on the checks (Anderhill Insurance) he would send to them every month because her mother didn't work.

It was ten when Raven was done cleaning up the house, so she left the house and headed for the one place of refuge she knew, the training center. But, as she was leaving the house, her mother came around the corner and shouted at her,

"Child! Get your asss back over her nouuw!" So close, Raven thought. She walked back over to where her mother was standing. "Thought you could leave the house without letting m' know, huh? Well, jackass, that's not truuue. Idiot Child!" She screamed, and her hand connected with Ravens face, leaving an ugly red mark. It wasn't the first time her mother had hit her, and probably wouldn't be the last.

"Sorry Mom…" She said in a high pitched whisper.

"Whatever! Get'cher sorry ass back in that house, get some money, and buy me fifteen candles!" She slurred out at her child.

"Candles, why-"

"CUZ I DON'T PLAAAN ON PAYIN THE ELK'TRIKLE BILL, HEAR ME?"

"Yes mom," she whispered with her head down. Afterwards, she scurried inside to take a look at her face in a mirror, which was already beginning to bruise underneath her right eye, and then she fetched some money from the jar above the counter for the fifteen candles her mother wanted. She hurried down the driveway and down the road into town.

* * *

Thunk! Thunk! Thunk!

It was the satisfying sound of her blade making target with the dummy. She quickly hurried over to the dummy to pluck out the knives before anyone could see her work. She didn't want people at the training center to know how good she was, It was her own little OCD thing. She checked around to make sure no one was watching, and landed three more knives. One between the eyes, in the throat, and in the center of the chest. She prided herself for her work with knives; although she desperately hoped she never have to use this skill. Despite being from what some would call a "Career District", she wasn't super excited about the games, and never planned on volunteering. Although 13 would be young to volunteer anyways. Personally she found them rather sickening, but seeing as there was nothing she could do about it, she didn't say anything.

She looked around the training center. Most people were casually going about their business, some with crowds, and others without. However, in one corner, by the spears and tridents, there was a very large crowd gathered around one boy with auburn hair and tanned skin, who was throwing tridents and wrestling with people. He was tall; she guessed maybe he was 15. He appeared rather cocky, and pleased with what he was doing. She could hear others around him shouting praise. Raven never liked large crowds. She glanced up at the clock, and cursed herself because she realized many of the stores would be closing soon.

'Shoot!' she thought to herself, 'I still need Candles!" and she hurried out of the training center.

* * *

"That'll be 16.43" Said the lady behind the counter. She had looked oddly at Raven when she had asked for so many candles, but gave them to her none the less. Raven paid the woman with a wrinkly twenty dollar bill. The woman on the other end of the counter looked at her sympathetically, and offered her a basket, to which she graciously accepted. She loaded the candles into the basket and started to trudge home. The basket was very heavy.

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**There we go, Chapter uno is up! I took a break from all of my other stories for a while to write this one, I've got a few chapters written already so I hope you like it. Yes, first chapter is a little slow but I just want to introduce you to the characters in the first two chapters before I launch right into the story. I've wanted to write one about Finnick for a while, but had never gotten around to it! And yes, Ravenclaw is a character I created because I never like Annie. Anyways, happy hunger games, read on, Imma go get some cookies and chocolate milk!**

**~LinneaPike**


	2. Finnick

Finnick

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Finnick Odair walked out of the training center as proud as a peacock. After successfully pinning down 3 other boys that were significantly larger than him, demonstrating once more that he had mastered the art of throwing and spearing with tridents, he decided to call it a day. He'd begun to make his way down the street towards his house, when one of his friends ran out of the training center and patted him on the back,

"I'll never understand how you do it man!" his friend told him

"Isn't It obvious I was born with mad skills?" he replied jokingly.

"Whatever... " he said, and trailed off a little. Then he came to and looked at Finnick with hopeful eyes, "So when do you plan on volunteering?" He stated.

"Woah, Jesus Geoff, hold on, I don't plan on volunteering!" Not that the idea had never been suggested to him before. All of the trainers at the center said that in four more years, when he was eighteen, he'd be a shoe in. But unlike many other people, Finnick understood the games. He had always closely watched the tributes who won, and aside from the career tributes from one and two, all of the others had the same dead, broken expression in their eyes. It was a look he never wanted to see in his own.

"Why? If you don't plan on volunteering then how come you've trained to be the best in our age group?"

"That's really only a precautionary measure…" he tried to explain to Geoff honestly.

"Well," he cut him off, "why don't you want to volunteer?" Geoff asked, looking thoroughly confused, "Come on, if you win you get a big house on the beach, billions and billions of dollars, and, not to mention, you're choice from every single girl in the entire District! Imagine the parties we could have if you won, which you would!"

Finnick was beginning to get annoyed with his friend, "Well what if I didn't win, huh? What then?" he told him darkly, "And even if I did win, I'd have to live with everything I'd done in the games! I don't want that!"

"You're just scared..." Geoff told him, and turned off down the street he lived on. When he had walked away Finnick sighed. He wished there was a way to make Geoff understand but there really wasn't. He could see black and white, winning and losing, but couldn't see the grey, which was the aftermath. He continued to think some very long train of thought, and he'd gotten so caught up in his thinking, he hadn't noticed how far he'd walked, and realized that he had passed his house probably five minutes ago. He stopped and looked around him, about to turn around, when he noticed someone up ahead. A girl, with long blond hair, maybe a year younger than him walking down the road carrying some sort of basket. Usually he would have just ignored the girl and turned around, but something compelled him to go and talk to her. So he jogged ahead effortlessly to catch up with her,

"Hi!" He told her. She looked at him and raised her eyebrows and replied a little uncertainly,

"Hi…"

"I'm Finnick! And you are…?"

"I know who you are," she replied with a soft smile, "You're at the training center every day with a huge crowd of people around you. But I'm Ravenclaw Carlyle. Call me Raven though, it's a bit less of a mouthful." Finnick laughed.

"Alrighty then, _Raven_. I've never seen you at the training center before though, so you must be new." He told her honestly, because really he never had.

"No, actually," she replied with tiny laugh, "I'm not new. I've been going to the training center since I was eight."

"Oh, wow," Finnick said awkwardly. He was surprised at how arrogant he must be if he could overlook someone who doesn't look like anyone else in the District for god only knows how many years. "I'm sorry…"

"Oh no don't worry!" she cut him off, "I try not to be noticed! I'm glad to know its working! I don't like having others know what I'm good at, I'm not sure why,though..."

"Clever," he replied honestly, "I'd never really thought of that. I guess it's a little too late for me to try that out, considering everyone knows what I do. Is this your second or third year of reaping?" He asked her.

"…First." She answered a little uncertainly.

"Oh you're only twelve?"

"No, I'm thirteen…" she answered

"But I thought-"

"I was sick with pneumonia last year and was excused. Actually I was more than excused, I was pretty much quarantined. They had me locked in a room so that no germs could get to me. So that makes this kind of like my first year." She explained with a nervous laugh. Finnick wasn't exactly sure why, but he wanted to reassure her.

"It's not really that scary. They just read off the names of two other people, and there you go! Chances are they won't pick you even if you have tesserae, because there's so many other people in District 4."

"Oh, okay." She replied looking a little better, but still nervous. "So the Reaping is in two weeks, do you plan on volunteering. Or just hope you get reaped?"

"I'm praying I don't get reaped, and I don't plan on volunteering," he told her, remembering his conversation with Geoff, "It's not for me, besides, I'm only fourteen so I would be a little young."

"Oh! I'm sorry, I just thought that… You know someone who trains so much might want to...uh… I don't plan on volunteering! And I don't want to be in the games either!" She stated, clearly trying to change the subject, "People think that afterwards it would all be well and fine, but they must be wrong, because I have no idea how you deal with it!"

"You think so too?" he asked her, thoroughly surprised she thought the same.

"Well ya, it would be terrible!" she said, looking up at him for the first time. He noticed she had almost completely black eyes, and a bruise form forming underneath of one that looked rather fresh.

"Are you alright," he asked her "you've got a bruise underneath your eye?" He wondered how she got it.

"Oh!" she replied, she looked down, her face reddening, "It's nothing! I just got into a fight!" she answered quickly. He knew she was lying; her body movement was enough to tell him. But he played along anyways,

"Oh really? Did you win?" he tried to sound like he thought she was being truthful, but his curiosity over how she got it only grew.

"Ummm, it was kind of a draw. We were about to get caught, so I ran off... Oh! Here's my place! Nice to meet you Finnick!" She told him with a smile and hurried towards the house with her basket. The house was slightly smaller than his and was white with a black roof. There was a stone walkway leading from the house to the front door. As he watched her hurry towards the house he realized he probably should have asked her if she needed help with the basket. So he turned and started home.

As he left, he could here shouting from the house, and then he heard a loud *crack*. He knew that sound. It was the distinct sound of hand-hitting-face. He stopped, and considered turning around to go back, but he knew that doing that would only get her in trouble. However he figured he no longer had to wonder where that bruise had come from. Or who really won that fight.

* * *

**OUUUUUUU! What was that noise? Well that was Finnick. and yes, it was the Finnick. I made adjustments to this chapter and the first one in case anyone was wondering. I went back and read it and I was like, oh god, why... But its good now, all goooood.**


	3. A nice thought

Raven

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Raven ran down the walkway to her house, only looking back once to make sure Finnick was gone or leaving. She saw that he had already begun to walk away, so she slowed to a walk. She was thinking about how close she had almost come to telling him how she'd gotten the bruise, how it almost slipped out. She wasn't thinking for long, though, because as she was stepping up onto the porch her mother came flying out the door, hollering and shouting.

"Where were you?!"

"I was in town!"

"You're late you useless!" she shrieked, "Get inside and make ma' supper!" Raven knew what was coming as soon as she seen the look in her mother's eyes, and had had enough sense to put down the basket, and her mother's hand made contact with her face for the second time that day. The hit was harder than Raven had anticipated however, and it sent her falling to the ground. Her mother turned on her heels and stumbled back inside.

Raven sat on the ground cradling her cheek, wishing that she hadn't lost track of time at the Training Center. She didn't delay long however, so she stood up with her still throbbing cheek, picked up her basket, and went inside to make her mother supper.

Raven quietly set to work in the kitchen, preparing something quick for her hungry and angry mother. Originally she had plans to make a stir fry, but because she needed something fast, she simply fried some bologna and put some fries in the oven. When the bologna was done, she put it on a plate and set it on the table. She let her mother know the fries would be just a minute, and then retreated to the bathroom to take a look at her face.

Her mother had hit her directly where her bruise from that morning had been, so it had hurt much more. Raven knew she would be lucky now if she didn't have a black eye. She went and retrieved some ice from the kitchen and returned to the bathroom to hold it over her face and try her best to minimize the swelling. She looked at herself in the mirror and thought about her walk home with Finnick.

She had honestly been surprised when he had come to talk with her, particularly because she knew that he lived nearer to the town and had already passed his house. Perhaps he had gotten lost. Or perhaps it was some practical joke from a soon to be career, but she highly doubted that because she had actually felt rather comfortable talking to him. Perhaps too comfortable, considering she had very nearly told him the truth about how she had gotten the bruise underneath her eye,

'Stupid!' she thought to herself, 'that cover story was terrible!' But he had caught her off guard; because it isn't often someone is concerned with her well-being. She knew that he probably figured she was lying, and had hoped that he had been far enough away to not hear the creaming and the slap her mother had given her when she had gotten home. That would be terribly embarrassing. She didn't need his pity, and she definitely didn't need someone telling her not to put up with it. He would only cause trouble for her and her mother and right then decided she would have no more to do with him. Just then, she heard the oven begin to ding, so she dropped the ice in the sink and ran out to take them out.

Thankfully the fries weren't burned; she'd have been in trouble then. She slid them onto a plate, and called her mother. Raven took a small portion for herself, ate quickly, and got as far away from her mother as possible. She hid in her bedroom, and looked out the window. To her, this was something she did often, but to an outsider, it would seem a little odd for a thirteen year old girl to be cowering in her room, trying desperately to block out the outside world, but it seemed perfectly normal to her.

* * *

She stayed in her room late after that, until she heard her mother go to bed. Once she was certain her mother was asleep, se crept out of her room, and out into the living room. She rifled through the closet by the door until she found her old worn sneakers, and slid them onto her feet. She stepped outside into the cool night air, breathing it in. Her room was a nice sanctuary, but it was stuffy. To her being outdoors or sitting on a log in the woods was just as good as sitting on a couch. She moved behind the house and walked into the woods, not far because she reached the fence, and picked up a blade of grass to test if it was on. It wasn't, but that didn't come as much of a surprise to her, because it was never on between twelve and three in the morning, although she had no idea why.

She made her way over to a hole in the ground and drug out some old fishing rope, threw it over her shoulder, and walked to her favorite tree. When you climbed this tree, the branches extended far enough over the fence for her to jump to another tree. The rope was really only in case of emergencies.

She had found the tree when she was seven. She had gone outside to play and made her way into the woods. The fence, which was not deep (just about a dozen meters behind the treeline), was buzzing with activity, but it didn't really scare her. She had been looking around for a new secret spot to play, when she had come across this tree. Tall and strong it looked, with many foot holes. It was fall, so the tree was many different colors, but for some reason other than that, she felt drawn to it. Before she knew what she was doing, she found herself climbing it. She found a sturdy branch, and sat on it, and looking closely at the branch and saw how it extended over the fence like a long arm. She slowly climbed out along it, until she found the branch entangled itself with the tree next to it, on the other side of the fence. She slowly climbed over to the other tree and down onto the ground, where she looked around and discovered this magical place that was freedom. Ever since then, she'd come out here regularly when the fence wasn't on.

So she followed her usual routine, climb the tree, cross the branch, and climb down the other tree. Once on the other side, she began to run through the woods, to a spot she had found. A clearing with one perfect little rock in it, and since then she had arranged other logs and flowers in it to make it feel homier. It wasn't a big spot, she didn't want any Capitol officials flying overhead to see her, but it was big enough. She walked into the middle and laid on her back to look up at the stars. This was where she did her real thinking.

She thought about the games, and how they were only two weeks away. She wondered whether or not she would be chosen, but then she figured that almost everyone wonders that before the reaping.

"What would I do if I got picked?" she wondered to herself, and the little voice of reason inside her head answered,

"Enter the games I suppose"

"Will I get picked?"

"Second year," she told herself, "probably not."

"I wonder what the Capitol is like…" she mused,

"You never want to find out."

"I suppose, but what would happen if I had to go into the arena?

"Fight I suppose,"

"Hmm, alright, but would I be a career?"

"You're thirteen. Guess."

She sighed and stood up. She had laid on the grass thinking for about a half an hour, longer than she thought. Usually her mind is clear, but something kept working its way into the back of her mind and she hated it. Something she was trying desperately not to think about. She walked out of the clearing and a little ways into the woods, where she found a patch of flowers she knew would be there. That was always there. She picked a few dandelions and lupins, brought them back to the clearing, and laid them in a certain spot towards the edge. It was where she had buried her first pet. A small white mouse it had been. She kept it in a cage in her room, because she was allowed with it since it had been a gift from her father for Christmas when she was ten, but it had died about 4 months ago. She had named it Firenze. She laid the flowers and slowly got up and made her way back home.

Once on the other side of the fence, she began to be more alert. She snuck back into the house, entered her room, and lay on her bed, pretending to be asleep. She thought about how crazy it would sound to someone else to her musing and talking out loud to herself in the woods. But she liked to pretend that voice was her little mouse, because he alone seemed to be the only one who could ever come close to understanding her fully. She liked to think it was Firenze.

It was a nice thought.

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**HEYYYYYY! How's it going my people of the internet! Like it! I bet you don't.. Seriously? 30 views, three reviews? C'mon. Anyway, thanks to Beingasalvatorgirl and AllisonJennifer for reviewing, muchly appreciated you TWO. beingasalvatorgirl is writing, like ligit, the best Vampire Diaries stories ever right now, so drop on by! DO IT! And AllisonJennifer wrote my favorite Primrose story/ Oneshot ever! Read!  
**

**~LinneaPike  
**


	4. Poetry

Finnick

* * *

"What's wrong, hun? You look worried."

"Nah mom, it's fine, I'm just tired." Finnick told his mother. She looked at him, concerned, then turned back to the kitchen and continued cooking,

"Alright whatever," she told him, "but there's no point in sitting there and staring at the uncooked food. Go do something; it won't be ready for about a half hour. But later I want to know why you took so long getting home! I was worried about you!"

"Alright, alright…" He stood from the round wooden table in the middle of their kitchen a walked towards the front door to step outside and breathe in the evening air. He sat down on the step.

After Raven had gone home, Finnick had turned to make his way home, but after her house was out of sight he could hear screaming, sounded like there was a fight going on. What really disturbed him was the *crack* he had heard afterwards, mainly because he knew she was lying about the bruise, and that sound provided a perfectly plausible explanation as to how she got it.

"_I got in a fight"_ she had said. He had good feeling who had won.

But who knows, he figured he was probably just over reacting and reading too much into it. He would find her at the training center tomorrow and ask. Yes, that would be the plan.

He went around to the backyard and laid down on the grass, staring up at the sunset colored sky. He started thinking a long train of thought, and somehow he began running through plans in case he got reaped. It was nothing new he did this every year. Traps, he wanted to use those. He had practiced tying knots down at the wharf with his dad before he had drowned when his fishing boat sank. Finnick missed him terribly. But his thoughts were cut off by his mom calling him in for supper.

He walked into the kitchen through the back door, and picked up a plate. His mother watched him thoughtfully. When he caught sight of her he asked,

"What?"

"Oh nothing," she said with a smirk, "Just you've been kind of weird since you got home. What took you so long?"

"Nothing, I was just thinking about the reaping then realized that I had kind of walked right by the house. I ended up all the way down by the Carlyle's." He left out the part about Raven, because for some reason he didn't want to talk about her with his mother. She believed him, or at least looked like she did. She gave him a sympathetic look,

"Worried? Hun there's no reason to be. You won't be picked, you're much too young."

"Ya, I know…" He replied. He was sick of hearing that. You can't guarantee that just because you're young you won't get picked. Two years ago, both of there tributes were twelve years old, so it came as no surprise when one died in the bloodbath and the other froze to death. But it proved that age has nothing to do with whether you'll be reaped or not.

They continued chatting for the rest of the meal, but Finnick's mother could tell her sons mind was somewhere else. When the meal was finished, she collected there dishes and washed them up, while Finnick went to his room. He shut the door, and bent under his bed to get something. It was a black notebook that looked very old, and on top of it there was a lead pencil. He sat on his bed and opened it, a few pages falling out. He picked one up and read it,

_A Dream Pang_

_I had withdrawn in forest, and my song  
Was swallowed up in leaves that blew away;  
And to the forest edge you came one day  
(This was my dream) and looked and pondered long,  
But did not enter, though the wish was strong:  
You shook your pensive head as who should say,  
'I dare not—too far in his footsteps stray—  
He must seek me would he undo the wrong.'_

_Not far, but near, I stood and saw it all_  
_Behind low boughs the trees let down outside;_  
_And the sweet pang it cost me not to call_  
_And tell you that I saw does still abide._  
_But 'tis not true that thus I dwelt aloof,_  
_For the wood wakes, and you are here for proof._

He had never shared any of his writing with anyone before. It was kind of like his own personal thing. The words just kind of came to him, and he had to write them down. Half the time he didn't even understand the poetry he wrote, but that didn't stop him. He remembered when he had written this particular one,

He had been wandering through the woods outside along the fence one day during the fall. The leaves had all turned color by then, and when you were walking under the maple trees it was like you had stepped into a painting. He was just wondering around when he came across a red fox looking at him from the other side of the fence. It didn't seem afraid, the little guy looked curious. He stood apart from most other foxes Finnick had seen, however, because he had three white paws, but one of his front ones was brown. He had tried to coax the fox to come onto his side of the fence so he could look at it. The fox had tried, and had succeeded, but in moving under fence had received a shock that had frightened him. He quickly turned around a scurried back into the forest, limping as he went. Finnick had felt bad for the poor creature, and over the course of the week would go outside to check for it, but it never came back. It was that day he had written that poem.

He slid the poem back into the binder and began doodling on one of the pages. When, all of a sudden, he stopped because he had just felt something enter his head, He flipped the page to start writing it, but the minute his pencil touched the page, the idea was gone as quick as it had come. So he closed his book, rolled over on his bed, and drifted off to sleep.

* * *

**Finnicks poem isn't mine, it's by Robert frost! Me and poetry don't exaactly mix, if you get me. This chapter doesn't have much to it, it was kind of just a filler to let people know what was going on inside Finnicks head. Anyways, I am very thankful to those of you who have reviewed, muchly apreciated, now, since my cat is bugging me to go and pet her (she's kind of sitting on me), I will leave you now! Adieu!  
**

**~LinneaPike  
**


	5. Knots

Raven

* * *

Raven managed to leave the house without any casualties today, and was very happy this morning to see that the bruise on her cheek had begun to fade a little. It wasn't a spectacular way to start off her day, but she figured that all in all it was pretty okay.

After she had prepared breakfast for her mother and had gotten ready, she made sure to remember this time to ask her mother if she needed anything in town. Her mother simply shrugged her off and walked to the fridge to, most likely, get another beer. She left the house quickly, practically running down the walkway. She was determined to get to the training center early, because she had decided last night while she was out in the woods that she wanted to learn how to tie knots, because she was dreadful at it. Closest she could come to tying a knot was tying her shoelaces. She also wanted to be somewhere she usually wasn't, because she had a funny feeling that Finnick would try to talk to her today, and since she wasn't sure whether or not he heard her mother screaming and hitting her yesterday evening, she wasn't going to take any risks of him finding out.

It was about a half hours walk into town, but Ravine managed to complete it in twenty five minutes. She always found she walked faster when she was thinking, and when she entered the Center she was delighted to see it was almost completely empty. She instinctively began to make her way over to the knife station, then realized what she had said about tying knots. So, she reluctantly turned towards the knot tying section and tried to get to work. She looked at the diagrams on the wall, and began to tie knots. She struggled with it for about an hour, and by then had only just succeeded in making an alpine knot. She looked down at her finished work proudly, then leaned closer to the wall to get a better look at the picture that told you what it should look like when it's done. To her delight, it was an almost perfect match.

'Maybe I've got a knack for this,' she thought, and a smirk reached her face. Just as she was going to untie the knot to do it again, she heard a familiar voice in her ear,

'Not going to learn much looking at those diagrams~' it said. The voice startled Raven, and she jumped. She turned around to see who was behind her, and it was unhappy to see it was just the person she was trying to avoid. It was Finnick. He had bent down and watched her tie the knot, and had seen her look over at the diagram. He had a smirk on his face and a rather mischievous look in his eyes, and she turned around to glare at him.

'Well I learned how to tie this one! It looks very strong if you ask me!" She shot at him. He moved to sit down, and he crossed his legs and looked at the knot.

'Well,' he said with a rather mocking smile, 'looks can be deceiving.' With that he gave one tug on her rope and watched it undo itself. She looked at the piece of limp rope that was once her beautiful knot and didn't say anything.

'Remind me never to go mountain climbing with you." He told her, wearing that same smirk. Maybe she had been wrong about him being a good guy.

"Hmph! Well if you're so damn intelligent," she spat at him, "Why don't you do it better!"

"Alright, alright, calm down."

And with that, he showed her how to make all kinds of different knots. Alpine knots, Dutch marine bowlines, double loops and egg loops. Raven had been surprised at how many different types of knots could make, and even more so at how he had mastered them all. At one point he had even tied a noose and pretended to hang himself for her amusement. She had laughed quite a bit at that, and she almost didn't recognise the sound that left her throat when she laughed. It had been so long since she last had. She was honestly surprised, but she actually quite enjoyed his company. By the time lunch came around, she had almost perfected making a net. He said that it would come in handy if she ever got reaped, because traps where something that no matter how trained you were you could still get caught in (if the person who had left the trap knew what they were doing of course). When Raven glanced at the clock what felt like only a few minutes later, she realised that it was already two o'clock. So she stood up and thanked Finnick for teaching her how to tie these knots (now she could say she wasn't as hopeless as before) and made her way over to the knife throwing station.

She loved the familiarity of the blade between her fingers, the weight of the knife in her hands, and the whistling sound it made right before it made contact with the bulls eye. She pulled back her arm and lifted the knife, then whipped it at the dummy. It landed perfectly in the center of the dummy's throat. An evil smirk crossed her lips as she approached the dummy to examine her handiwork.

_'It would have been a kill'_ she thought to herself.

Raven removed the knife and walked back to the tape line on the floor, and then stood a few feet behind it. She then threw four more knives and the all landed on target: Between the eyes, in the throat, in the chest, and in the stomach. Raven had no idea why seeing her knives sticking out of that dummy gave her so much pleasure, because she did not enjoy the thought of taking another's life, but there was just something about knives that did it for her. Not that she had a chance to think about that long, however, because one of the trainers came out in front of the center and began to make an announcement.

"Can I have your attention please? Attention, thank you! This year, once again, we will be hosting our annual Wildlife Campout that will take place this coming Saturday. If you want to participate, sign up on the sheet that will be posted on the front door of the building. We will randomly shuffle you into age appropriate groups, and the list will be on the door next to the signup sheet this Thursday, or in two days' time. Thank you." When he finished, the center was buzzing with chatter, and Raven also found herself wanting to sign up. So she walked over and managed to push her way through the crowd and signed her name on the bottom, right underneath of '_Thomas Marinas'_ and _'Bastina Marinas'_. Once she had signed her name, she backed out of the crowd and returned to the dummy she was at earlier and plucked out the knives she had thrown. She carefully laid them back where they belonged, and slipped out the back door to avoid the large crowd near the front doors, feeling she had accomplished just enough for one day.

Once Raven had exited the Training center, she made her way down the road, towards her house, and then turned off down a dirt road towards the beach. At the end of this road there was a small dock that her father owned with a fishing boat tied to it. She looked around to make sure there was no one there, and when she thought the coast was clear, she removed her long sleeved shirt and shorts to reveal a bathing suit, then stepped up onto the edge of the boat and ran across it, and dived off the edge into the water. When she surfaced again, she had a broad smile on her face and her hair was soaking wet. She swam around for a few minutes when she turned around to face the dock again, and almost choked when she saw who was standing on it.

"Finnick!"

"Hi!" he grinned at her. He was standing on the edge of her father's boat without a shirt on, looking down at her.

"Wh-what are you doing here?!"

"Well if you must know," he answered, "I was walking home a little behind you and when you turned down here, I wondered where you were going. I followed you and you led me here! Nice place." He said approvingly. He then turned his head back to her with a devilish look in his eyes, and shouted, "I'm coming for a swim!" He dived into the water right to her, sending water flying everywhere, and when he reappeared he was right beside her with a grin on his face,

"How's it going?"

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**Yaay! Surprise Finnick again at the end of this chapter! Makes me happy! Actually just about everything about Finn makes me happy so yanno... Anyway, read review!Now I must leave because it's 8:41 and I have to go to class, so bye bye! Oh and I didn't publish this until 12:23!  
**

**~LinneaPike  
**


	6. Swimming

**Oh God guys, I'm so sorry that took so long. When I went to write the next chapter, I save over this one and had to write it again! DX Agh! But anyways, I was so excited for this chapter because I get to bring out some of Finnicks little mischievous side, which I love! Alors, lisez!**

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**Finnick**

"How's it going?" He asked. Raven stared at him blankly, and he assumed it was because she was surprised he was there. He grinned as he watched her struggle to find words, and swam away from her to dive again.

"Good..?" She replied, a little uncertainly. Finnick looked at her curiously, then laughed,

"Are you okay?"

"What?" She asked, rolling her shoulders. She seemed like she hadn't heard him and suddenly clued into what he was saying, "Oh, oh yeah I'm fine, you just scared me is all." She replied, rolling her shoulder's in the water. These were lies. Finnick knew she was lying, because whenever she would she'd roll her shoulders back. However, to keep the conversation from getting awkward, he smiled mischievously and swam up to her, so that his face was mere inches from hers and asked,

"Are you sure you're not speechless because you can't believe how good I look shirtless?"

"Ha!" she laughed, "Ya that's definitely it!" She pushed him away, and with that, she seemed to shrug off whatever had been bothering her and began to swim around once more. She rolled onto her back and began to do a backstroke, diving occasionally. When she surfaced for a third time, she was holding a rock that was orange and brown and was staring at it curiously. Finnick took this opportunity to ask her,

"So what is this place?" He was genuinely curious, because the place was rather beautiful. He had been walking home slightly behind her when he had remembered he had forgotten to ask about the screaming and the not-so-mysterious crack sound he had heard. He had seen her walking up ahead of him and was going to catch up to her, when he noticed she had stopped. She looked around and when she thought the coast was clear had ducked down a road. Finnick had wondered where she was going, and decided to follow her. The road wasn't long, however it was rather narrow.

When he came to the end of it, he was on a clear, private beach. The sand was white and there was a short, fat dock right where the road ended. Tied to the dock was a fishing boat with the name, _The Raven_ tattooed on the side, and on the beach aside from the dock, there were discarded training clothes and a gym bag. The boat brought back sad memories of his father, who had drowned at sea 5 years previously when his fishing boat had sunk during a storm. However Finnick's thoughts and snooping around had been interrupted by a splashing sound, someone diving into the water. Figuring it was Raven, he took off his shirt and walked along the deck, the across the boat to where she had just surfaced, and stood above her. Figuring he could probably get a good scare out of her, he waited until she turned around to make himself noticeable, and was pleased to see he had succeeded in frightening her.

"This place?" she answered, looking around, "It's just where my dad like to tie his boat. Not that he goes out very often, considering he's only ever home at Christmas and comes home for the summer like, once every two years. He bought the property off of some rich aristocrat guy from the other side of town. I like to come swimming here because it's quiet and peaceful. But you're welcome to come any time." She shrugged.

"Cool, cool…" he said absentmindedly. Then suddenly, and idea came to him, and a devilish smile made its way across his face. He 'absentmindedly' swam around so he was behind where Ravine had star fished out onto her back, and when he was right behind her head, he grabbed her shoulders and dunked her under. When she came back up, she was spluttering and spitting out water, and as she swam to the boat to take a breather, he could hear her spitting out,

'you ass…you complete ass… oh my god…" This only caused Finnick to laugh even harder than he already was, and when Raven had caught her breath, she turned to him,

"Okay, okay," she said smiling and nodding her head, "you got me." She swam out a little, and then dived underwater. Finnick was sure she would resurface on the other side of him, but when nothing was happening, he got confused. Just when he had thought she was joking, he felt something close around his ankle and before he could react, he was pulled underwater. When he resurfaced again, Raven was above the water laughing her head off. Finnick noticed she had the most musical laugh, and wished she would laugh more often. They splashed and jumped around in the water for about another half hour, and at one point Finnick even threw her up into the air back into the water. When they were done, they crawled back up onto the shore and dried themselves off. Raven was happy and was clearly not paying attention to what she was doing, because when Finnick glanced over at her, he saw it. It was a large, black-ish, blue-ish bruise that ran along the side of her ribs, and another one on her back. Finnick sucked in air, but she pulled a shirt over her bathing suit and the bruises were gone as quickly as they appeared. Finnick tried to shrug it off, but seeing those bruises only confirmed his worst fears, and he knew that those bruises would haunt him for a long while. But he remained impassive, and when Raven offered him her towel, he tried to refuse, but she told him,

"Go on, it's not mine anyways, I stole it from the Training Center." And so, they turned around and started there walk home. When they got back to the main road, he looked at her with sad puppy dog eyes,

'Walk me home?'

'You're crazy." She told him.

'Actually,' he corrected her, 'I prefer the term mentally hilarious.' This made her laugh.

So they continued the path along the road, and when they got to Finnick's house, Raven looked at him and waved goodbye, but as she was leaving Finnick caught her by the wrist.

"Raven." His tone was suddenly serious. He was going to get answers. "Where did those bruises on your back come from? And what was that shouting I heard yesterday when I left your house?" She narrowed her eyes at him, and she practically hissed out what she was saying.

"I really don't think it's any of your business." She wrenched her hand free from his, and ran off down the road. Finnick considered chasing after her, but he decided against it. He was angry with himself for being so forward with it. He should have taken a more cautious approach. Now, he figured, he would be lucky if she would even look at him. So with a disappointed sigh, he turned around and walked back up to his house, and only realizing once he got there, he still had the Training Center towel.

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**DUM DUM DUM... Actually, no, that's not really a cliffhanger. I'm lying, someone send me to jail. But it's unfortunate! Because people shouldn't fight. WORD PEACE for the win! But there is no peace in this story, oh no my pretties, these two's list of troubles has only just begun, muahahahaha... Obviously though, because if this was about them living happily ever after, no one would read it, right? Admit it, I am. Aurevoire, et bonne soirée!**

**~LinneaPike  
**

**PS: I'm thinking about changing the name of this story. It's kind of dumb and I only really used it because I was pressed for a title. Any suggestions?  
**


	7. Questions, fists, and electrical bills

**Haha! Another Chapitola :) Ya, I know Im not updating as fast as before, but I started writing a super long chapter and kind of forgot :P Oh, and for those of you who havent noticed, I changed the story name :)) It is now, _Ravensong_ instead of _Missing illusion_ bevcause the old title really didn't make much sense. Anyways, read on! **

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Raven

"I really don't think it's any of your business." Raven wrenched her hand free from his, and ran off down the road. She hoped Finnick wouldn't chase after her, but she had a feeling he wouldn't. Raven knew she had never run so fast in her life and kept her head down the whole way. She was so scared, so scared that things would change somehow now that someone knew, even if there weren't any laws against child abuse in District 4. Raven stayed so focused on the 'pat' of her feet against the concrete sidewalk, she almost overshot her house. She took one last look up the road behind her then walked into her house.

The house was oddly quiet when she got home, which was strange because her mother wasn't exactly the sneakiest person around. She looked around the house and couldn't find her mother, so she hollered for her, but there was no response. She peered into the backyard, and concluded that since it was empty her mom wasn't home.

Once the coast was clear, she made for the bathroom. She slammed her fists into the old porcelain countertop, and stared at herself in the mirror. She was so, so disappointed in herself for letting him see those bruises, she was always so vigilant about hiding them, but around Finnick, she was never as careful as she usually was, and that made her angry. He made her let her guard down, and she had to make sure that never happened again. She let out a sound that was halfway between a groan and a scream as she looked at herself in the mirror, then swept out of the bathroom and down the hall into her bedroom, and closed the door with a slam. She just needed to get away from the world for a while, but since she couldn't go anywhere near the woods she loved with the fence on, she crawled into the back of her closet and hid there for a while, until she drifted off to sleep.

Raven stayed hidden in the closet until she heard her mother stumble through the front door around four, waking her up, at which point she crawled out of the closet, said a quick hello to her mother, and began preparing supper. Since she had lost time when she had fallen asleep, she hadn't begun to prepare anything, so to keep her mother happy since it would be supper soon, she trew some chicken nuggets in the oven, and began took out some bread, toasted it, and made toast. When the chicken nuggets were done, she quickly took them out of the oven and peeled the bread off from around them to make them look fancier. She spread some garlic butter on the toast. Raven sat them on the table and ate quietly with her mother. They sat in silence, until her mother spoke uo,

"Good god you're ugly." Raven said nothing. She continued, "I really should go to jail for bringing a useless like you into this world! Ha!" She let out her bark of a laugh, because apparently in her drunken starte she found this hilarious. Raven just ate her meal and imagined she was somewhere else, because her mother had a point. Raven couldn't see it, but if her own mother said she was ugly, then she must be pretty bad. She lowered her head like a sad dog.

They ate the rest of there meal in silence, her mother would sometimes let loose tiny strings of insults, but they would only be mutterings. Raven didn't pick her head up again that meal, and vaguely heard her mother stand up and move to go outside and probably drink some more. However she paused at the door and Raven looked at her quizzically, and saw her mother observing a spoon in her hand.

"Clean this mess up stupid!" And she whipped the spoon at Raven. Had Raven not been sitting down, she may have been able to dodge it, but she just lifted her arm in time and the spoon hit her arm. Her mother gave a snort and left.

Raven stood up and cleaned the mal as fast as she could, and finally let a few tears slide silently down her face. She had almost learned not to cry, but she was still young. She left the kitchen spotless, because she didn't want to give her mom something else to get mad at her about. She ran to her room and closed the door, crawling like a beaten dog into the tiniest place she could find, her closet. There, she cried. She cried because he was scared, all the time. She cried because she wanted everything to get better, even though she knew that it wouldn't. She cried because she never knew what to do and even I she could, there was always someone stopping her. And eventually, she cried herself to sleep.

* * *

Screaming. That's what Raven woke up to. Then she heard fists, rapping against her bedroom door. It didn't take her long to put together the pieces of the puzzle, she realised almost immediately she had overslept. She crawled as fast as she could out of the back of her closet, and as soon as she had stood up her mother came flying into her room. Before Raven could register what was going on in her sleepy state, she was on the floor, her mothers fists were beating against everything they could find.

_Thud_

Below the rib, below the collar bone, beside her spine all over her back

_Thud_

Raven rolled over and she was facing her mother,

One in the shoulder, then in the stomach,

Then another,

Then another,

Then another,

And then, all of a sudden, it stopped, and her mother swept out of the room as quickly as she had come in. Raven sat there, below her bed, frozen. Too scared to move and see if anything was broken, too scared to have to look at her mother again. But Raven knew that if she stayed where she was, it would only happen again. So, shakily, she rose to her feet, testing her weight, and was pretty sure that nothing was broken. She move gingerly, each step brought a new wave of pain, and she left her room with her eyes glued to the floor. She entered the kitchen and began making breakfast, but when it was ready she didn't eat it. She simply moved over to the living room and began clearing away beer bottles from the previous night. 11. She counted eleven beer bottles. It was wrong, all wrong! Raven knew her mother shouldn't be doing this, however Raven also knew she could do nothing to stop it. A tear tried to slip its way down her face, but she blinked it away and told herself that crying was wrong, and you can only cry when you're alone. She took them outside and placed them in the recycling bin. When she came back in, she just saw her mother sweeping out the back door with a six-pack under her arm. Raven cleared up her mother's mess, but all of a sudden she stopped. She remembered her mom saying she didn't want to pay the electric bill, and she knew her mother's wrath would be terribly if her precious TV stopped working. So she looked out the window and saw her mom, lying flat face in the grass, with a puddle of vomit nearby.

So she thought of a plan. It was risky, but it would be worth it in the long run. She pulled a chair over from the table and stood on it in front of the fridge. She opened a small wooden cupboard, and pulled out a small box, containing the family's money. She took out just enough to pay the bill, and thought about taking some for a treat on the way home, but decided she'd better not push her luck. So she jumped down from the chair after putting the till back exactly where she found it, and she snuck out the house and left for town.

* * *

Once Raven reached the town, she took the path left of the town square towards the building that the electrical company ran their business out of. He walked up the stone steps in front of the building, and when she opened the door, looked around and walked up to a lady behind a counter.

'Um,' she began, the lady looked up at her, 'I'm here to pay a bill.' she told the woman a little uncertainly. The woman behind the desk looked at her funny, but replied none the less,

'Oh, and who's bill might that be?'

'The Carlyle's,' The woman behind the desk gave her an odd look, but she rummaged through her desk none the less and took out the necessary files and accepted Ravens money, but the while transaction was really one rather awkward situation. When it was finally done, Raven thanked the woman and left the building. She quickly walked down the marble steps and turned back towards the square, when she heard someone call her name from behind,

'Raven!' She turned around just in time to see an auburn haired boy running towards her, and her heart sank when she realised it was Finnick/ She looked around her, wondering if there was any place she could run and hide, but to her dismay she was in a pretty open area, and in the time it took her to decide whether or not to run, he was in front of her.

'Finnick.' She greeted him icily,

'Listen, I know you probably don't want to talk to me, and rightly so, but just hear me out okay.' He looked at her hopefully and she found it was hard to say no, so she sighed and turned to him,

'What is it?'

'Okay, listen,' he rushed out, and he took her off guard because he almost looked like he was pleading with her, which was so different from his usual cocky, sure of himself demeanor. 'I'm sorry about yesterday. I, I shouldn't have been so forward, it's not my business. Can we just forget about it? Please?' Raven wasn't quite sure what to say. She had never had someone genuinely mean what they said when they were apologizing to her before. She knew that being friends with Finnick was risky, and thus was her chance her to break it off. He was observant, too observant, and he noticed things about her that she didn't want people to notice. But on the other hand, she did quite like talking to him, and he was almost someone she would like to call a friend. She missed his company. In the end, her want to have a friend ruled out her fears of what he could learn, and she softened her expression and smiled at him,

'Ya, it's fine. Water under the bridge' she said softly. She could see him visibly relax and return to his usual self at her response, and she was suddenly very glad she had chosen to forgive him because she felt like if she hadn't, he would have followed her until she had.

'Well then, lovely day isn't it' he purred out in his usual voice.

'Why yes,' she replied, 'I suppose it is.' She hadn't really realized that she actually missed talking to him until now.

'Care to join me for a walk?'

'Well…' she tried to answer, but he cut her off.

'Pleeeeease?' he said, pushing out his bottom lip in attempt to make a puppy dog face. H failed terribly, making Raven laugh and answer sarcastically,

'How could I say no to that face?'

'My thoughts exactly."

* * *

**I know** **I could never say no to Finnicks puppy dog face, no matter how shitty it was :3 Anywyas, hoped you all like it :D**


	8. Walk through the woods

**Woohoo, chapter eught! And oh my god, I love you guys! SOooooooo MUCH! The most amazing feeling ever is logging onto fanfiction and seeing that youre reviews have doubled! Holy Super Bananas!**

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**Raven**

Raven had thoroughly enjoyed her walk with Finnick. They had passed right by the training center, and had talked for quite a while about things like the campout and who planned on volunteering this year. They talked about how they thought the games were repulsing and strategies they would use just in case the unimaginable happened. They walked around for about an hour, and then Raven knew she really couldn't afford to be any later getting home, so she said farewell to Finnick and left for home.

She got home around three, with plenty of time to get something out and make a real meal for supper. As much as she loved eating chicken nuggets and bologna, she knew she needed real food. Not that she ever ate much anyways, but she figured she should keep up her strength just in case. She started cooking supper, and when it was ready, she put the chicken and potatoes in the oven and waited for them to be ready. Since they wouldn't be ready for a long time, she retreated to the bathroom to check out her bruises. They really weren't in any better condition, but it was nice to imagine she could see some change. She leaned forward, resting her elbow on the counter and her head in her hand, and thought about something that had been puzzling her for a while. Finnick.

Why did she want to talk to him? To be honest, she never really sought out his company, he just kind of came to her. Not that she minded, it was nice talking to someone once and a while. She felt like a nobody, or a wallflower. She didn't stand out and she didn't try to stand out, she wasn't noticed and didn't want to be noticed. But then came along Finnick, noticing her! It made her both angry and somewhat excited, because no one had ever taken the time to notice her before. He seemed nice enough, but she didn't want to call him a friend just yet, more like a casual acquaintance. He seemed to have a rather high opinion of himself, but unlike other girls, Raven didn't fawn all over him because she found it ridiculous and degrading, although she would admit she had seen worse looking people before. Honestly she didn't know what to think, so she decided not to think anything at all.

She left the bathroom and busied herself doing other chores around the house until the timer on the stove went off, and she removed the meal from the oven. She got it ready to eat, then let her mother know it was ready and took her meal outside. She sat on the grass in the backyard and slowly ate her food, hoping her mom would like the meal. Raven stared out at the woods behind her house, and decided that she would go for a walk in them again that night, and they if next day she would see who she was in a team with for the camping trip. She had never been on one before, so she figured this would be exciting.

She finished up her meal and went inside to clear up her mother's mess, and then proceeded to put it away so that she could heat it up later. She made a few meals after this, some breakfast, some lunch, some supper. She wanted to make sure her mom had supper while she was gone on the campout, so that when she got back her mother wouldn't be in a rage about having to make supper. She put them in the fridge and retreated to her room. She stayed there for the rest of the night, until she heard her mother go to bed, at which time she slipped out of her room and into the night.

Once Raven had left the house and made her way over the fence, she walked up the hill on the other side and turned right until she reached the clearing where she had buried her mouse. She walked over to the round stone she used to mark his grave and removed the flowers, then threw them out and left to get new ones. She walked over into the open meadow and picked some flowers, but when she returned to the clearing, she happened upon an unusual sight. A red fox, but it was different than normal foxes, it had three white paws, but one of his front ones was brown. He didn't seem afraid, rather, curious.

'Hey buddy!' She said in a calm voice, crouching down to be level with him, 'What are you doing here?' The fox simply cocked its head, trying to take her all in. It padded a few steps closer to her, and sniffed around on the ground about a foot from where she stood. 'Come here' she said in a soft, calm voice. The fox wouldn't come any closer, but he didn't seem like he was going to run away, so she picked up her flowers and stood back up, making slow movements so as not to startle the poor creature, and laid the flowers on her mouse's grave. The fox followed behind her, watching her curiously. When she was done, she left the grave and she sat in the middle of the clearing and addresses the fox,

'Brave you are, coming up to me. How do you know I won't shoot you?' The fox blinked at her. 'I suppose I wouldn't have anyways. You're a funny looking creature. I think, I shall name you Apollo.' She stood up and began moving around again, rearranging things, and stayed in the clearing talking to Apollo for about another fifteen minutes then headed for home. She crossed the fence, and soundlessly made her way back into the house and slipped back into her room. She lay down on her bed, vaguely remembering before sleep pulled her under, that the campout teams would be on the wall tomorrow.

When Raven woke up the next morning, she was buzzing with excitement over the campout. She got herself dressed in her favorite training clothes that her father had sent her for her birthday in April, and wore a sweater over her tee shirt in case it was cold those nights. The trip would be two nights and three days. Friday, Friday night, Saturday, Saturday night, and they would come back Sunday morning. At around ten, after her mother had eaten breakfast, she slipped out of the house and went to the training center without breathing a word of it to her mom. She knew that as long as there was food in the fridge her mother wouldn't even notice she was gone.

Raven arrived at the training Center around ten thirty, and slipped into the center unnoticed. There were pages all around the training center of the team lists. Four people per team, and each team was labelled a different color. She moved over to look at a list that didn't have many people crowded around it, and searched for her name. It took her about five minutes to find her name, because there were so many people around her, and about fifteen different teams. She eventually found her name, however, underneath of the Maroon team. It said,

_Maroon Team:_

_Ravenclaw Carlyle (13),_

_Bastina Marinas (12),_

_Thomas Marinas (14),_

Then Ravens eyes scrolled down to the last name, and when she read it, she really couldn't help but think in her head, 'are you kidding me?'

_Finnick Odair (14)._

Raven couldn't help but sigh. She liked him, but how is it she always ends up somewhere with him. She turned to walk away from the sign, but she bumped right into someone. Guess who.

"You know," Finnick said to her, shaking his head but smiling seductively all the while, "There are girls who would kill to be in that group with me".

"You're not my type" She answered. He looked at her with mock sympathy,

"Keep telling yourself that." And he walked away. She shook her head and smiled, then made her way over to the supply table. Each group was issued individual backpacks that could contain anything from a sleeping bag to a pack of matches to a rock and a stick, with a note that said 'figure it out" on it. Each team was also issued one knife, a long hunting knife for cutting things. When everyone had their backpacks and was ready, the training center employees called them together and gave them a rundown of the rules and they left for the woods. They were all given individual maps to their campsites, and each team was responsible for looking out for one another after that. It was about a half hour walk to the edge of the District, and they came to a fence that was heavily guarded with peacekeepers. When the head trainer showed them a note they opened the gate and allowed them to pass. Once they got to a clearing in the woods, the trainers gave them all maps to their designated camp sites and sent them on their way. Raven, along with her team members, found there designated campsite to be about a half hours walk. It was a small clearing; maybe half the size of the one behind her house with solid ground and dark trees around it, and the middle was a small maroon colored flag. When they arrived, they set down their gear and looked around. Finnick caught sight of the flag, and ran to the middle to lift it up. He looked at it then put it back in the ground, then said with fake sincerity, nodding his hea

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**You like**? **I promise theres more action in the next chapter, like, real action. Violence. Although, mind you, it's a long one. Oh and btw, I read an old authors note for a few chapters back and saw that when I tried to say world peace, it came out as word peace. Oh, that made me chuckle... Anyways READ AND REVIEW :)))**

'Nice place'


	9. Midnight Madness

**Woh, okay, sorry for the wait! That was awful of me, I know.. Anyway prepare for a super long chapter, I guess...  
**

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**|Raven|**

Once settled into their camp, Raven looked around to observe these two newcomers, Thomas and Bastina. Bastina was a small girl, maybe 4'11". She had choppy shoulder length jet black hair and shining sea green eyes. She couldn't weigh more than95 pounds. Raven had also found out on the walk over that Thomas was her older brother, which she probably should have guessed given the last names. He stood about maybe a few inches shorter than Finnick and had the same black hair and green eyes that his sister did, but he was slightly more muscular than her. But he was quiet, much unlike his beyond outgoing sister.

The four children decided it would be best to first sort through their supplies. They had the hunters knife that came with the bag, two sleeping bags, three packs of dried beef (which when rationed would probably only last them until Saturday afternoon), a pack of matches that only had two in it, and four empty water bottles. Raven sighed. This backpack was really just laughing at them. They divided the stuff up equally, each of them receiving a water bottle, they put the meat back in the bag along with the knife, laid out the sleeping bags, and each kept and water bottle for themselves.

"Okay!" Finnick piped up, "We should probably all start getting to work finding water and building a fire, and stuff."

"Alright then," Raven said, "I'm gonna go find some water. You guys cool with that?" She looked at Finnick, Thomas, and Bastina. Finnick looked fine with it, and Bastina was so busy staring at him that she probably hadn't even heard her, but Thomas looked worried.

"Okay," he said hesitantly, "but wait a second." He pulled the backpack they'd brought with them over to him, rifled through it, and pulled out the hunting knife. He tossed it to her, and she caught it. "Just in case." She gave him a small smile and replied,

"Okay." Then turned around and headed off into the woods. She walked around for a while, feeling at the moss for we spots, following animals, but over an hour passed and she didn't find anything. She sighed and let out a frustrated moan, turning the blade over in her hands. It was maybe a foot long with a sturdy steel handle, perfect for cutting things, but they'd be screwed if they ever needed to saw anything.

She looked around her, angry that she'd been looking for so long and had still come up empty. She decided she would just return to the camp to see how the others were, and set back out again later that night. She stood up and wiped the grass off her but, then realised with a groan her but was brown from sitting next to some mud. Wait…

Mud.

Water! That means there's water nearby! She stood up and started following where the mud went, and surely enough right behind a bush a couple of feet from her here was a pond. A beautiful pond hidden by trees, Raven was so happy to see it. She quickly ran over to it and filled up her water bottle, taking a good look around her to make sure she would remember how to find this place again. Once she had filled up her water bottle, she turned around and began walking back towards the camp to get the others now that she knew there was water around, and on the way back made extra care to remember her trail. She arrived back at her camp maybe fifteen minutes later and looked around. The others had made good progress. Bastina had rolled out the sleeping bags and begun dividing the food. She was just in the middle of putting together a rather nice fire pit, while stealing glances Finnicks way every few seconds. That child was ridiculous. When she looked around for Finnick and Thomas, she saw them hauling sticks and branches out of the woods and putting them in a neat pile towards the edge of the clearing. She cleared her throat and stepped out of the woods, announcing loud and proud,

"I found water!" Everyone picked their heads up to look at her, and Bastina stood up from her position over by the fire pit to come talk to her.

"That's great!" she told Raven. Finnick and Thomas stood up and walked up to her, while he with a smirk on his face, followed by Thomas, and asked

"Jeez," he said tauntingly, "what took you so long? But I should have figured, But I should have figured, yanno, you've never really been the brightest light bulb on the shelf." Raven laughed and punched him in the shoulder,

"You're one to talk. Anyways," she said, noticing that Bastina was watching her enviously, "I'm going back to the pond I found, and I'll take your water bottles to fill them up." They all agreed and handed her their water bottles, but Raven was surprised when Bastina volunteered to go with her.

"Ya, I'll go! I want to know where this pond is too!" Raven didn't object, although she wasn't exactly thrilled about the fifteen minute walk to the pond she would have to spend listening to the younger girls chatter. They headed out soon after, and Bastina went on and on about boyfriends, television shows, and clothing, absolutely none of the things that Raven was interested and she soon found herself not even trying to listen what she was saying and just tuned her out completely. Thankfully Raven had found the proper way back, and they found the pond without a problem. When they arrived, Raven cut off Bastina in mid-sentence as she was talking about how the most _handsome_ boy from District two who volunteered last year, but she stopped immediately when Raven spoke. She was actually rather quiet the entire time, except as Raven stood up after filing her last water bottle she began to speak again.

"So, what are you and Finnick?" Bastina asked, suddenly serious.

"Oh." Raven answered, taken aback, "Well, we're humans I guess, but I don't think that's what you're talking about. What do you mean?"

"I mean" she said, sounding exasperated that Raven didn't know what she was talking about, "are you guys like, a couple or like, friends with benefits?"

"Umm…" Raven was unsure of what she was supposed to say, because Bastina had asked her the one question about Finnick she wasn't quite sure of the answer too. "Well, we're friends I think…"

Finnick Odair was Ravens friend. She was surprised to hear the words coming from her mouth, but she supposed it made sense. Her and Finnick were friends.

"Oh thank god!" Bastina said, "Because he teases you a lot and I didn't know if he was flirting or what, thank god!"

"In case you haven't noticed, he kind of flirts with everyone." She told Bastina, uncomfortable that the girl wanted to include her in well, girl talk.

"But he doesn't flirt with me! Am I not good enough or something? It doesn't make sense, I just wish he would flirt with me too!?" Raven decided not to point out it may have something to do with the fact she's twelve. After her little outburst, Bastina slid right back into the loop of her continual girl chatter. About ten minutes later, they were back in the camp

**|Finnick|**

Finnick and Thomas had finished stacking enough wood about ten minutes after the girls left, and then proceeded to wander into the woods to find decent sized logs for them to sit on around the fire. Once they realized that most of the logs around them were rotten and filled with ants and other such creatures the decided it would probably be best if they both sat on the ground. Finnick noticed that Thomas was quiet, except when he began bickering with his sister. He seemed to be the only one who could stem the constant flow of noise coming from her. Finnick wasn't entirely sure if he liked Bastina, he found her to be annoying and was like all the other girls who would crawl all over him. That's why he was actually kind of relieved to be put in a group with Raven, because it would be a welcome break.

The two made their way back to the campsite to wait for the girls, and Finnick sat down by the fire. A few minutes later, Thomas came and sat across from him and began talking.

"Sorry about my sister. You probably find it weird that she's right obsessed with you, but she's a bit of a pain in the ass." He said seriously, looking at the ground. Finnick laughed,

"It's cool," he answered. "You two are really different, you're right quiet and she's…" Finnick trailed off trying to think off a word that wouldn't sound too insulting, but Thomas finished it for him.

"Loud? Obnoxious?"

"Well I wouldn't have exactly put it that way, but I guess a little bit. I hope they get back soon, I'm _so_ thirsty!" The conversation trailed off for a minute, but Thomas started it back up again,

"Are you and Raven friends?"

"Oh," Finnick answered, a little surprised, "Ya I guess so, why do you ask?"

"No reason, you just act funny around her and tease her a lot."

"What do you mean I act funny around her?" Finnick asked warily.

"I, I don't know, it's kind of like you've claimed her." Thomas replied with an odd look on his face.

"What?" Finnick had no idea what this kid was going on about.

"It's just the way you act around her, it's like you're trying to say that no one is allowed to hurt her, I guess. It's kind of like you're playing the part of the big brother, but not quiet, it's like you're saying no one else can have her or something."

"Are you saying that I like, like her or what?" he said, still very confused as to what the other boy was getting at.

"No, no, not like that. You just seem really protective of her; it's kind of funny to watch." He finished, smirking. Finnick snorted. This kid was weird, he never saw himself as protective of her. Obviously he'd be pissed if someone hurt her, he'd be pissed if someone hurt any of his friends, but he felt like that wasn't what Thomas was getting at. He flopped out onto his back on the grass and watched the clouds pass by for a while, until his thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice.

"What a productive bunch we have here." He picked his head up and turned around to see Raven standing at the edge of the clearing smirking at the two of them, with Bastina following behind her.

"I find it hard to work when I am out of water." He retorted playfully. She laughed, the proceeded to take one of the two water bottles she was holding a whipped it dangerously close to his head, but he caught it. She walked into the campsite and took the other bottle and tossed it to Thomas, then sat down on the grass near him. Bastina followed suit,

"I like what you've done with the place" she said looking around.

"Why thank you," Thomas replied, "it means a lot coming from you sis." He answered sarcastically.

"I wasn't _talking _to you useless." She hissed at him. Finnick noticed the two never seemed to miss a chance to insult the other. Thomas shot his sister a withering glare.

The rest of the afternoon slipped by lazily, the looked around in the woods to see if they could find any berries or food, and Bastina proved herself to be a very useful asset when collecting plants, having pointed out to Finnick that he was in the middle of picking a handful of berries off of what he thought was a blueberry bush, but were actually berries called 'night lock' that would kill you within seconds of swallowing it. They did however, find a blueberry bush that was ripe for the picking, and they all took handfuls of them back to their camp. That night, Finnick and Raven decided to give the sleeping bags to Thomas and Bastina, and the two slept on the grass.

Over the course of the few days that had passed, Finnick noticed large changes in Raven. When he had met her, she was quiet and closed, and was so serious. However lately, he noticed she was beginning to open up, not much, but ever so slightly he was beginning to see a new side of her, a happier side of her. She was smiling, and every so often you would elicit a laugh from her, not a breathy one that meant she acknowledged something was funny, but one that meant she was genuinely enjoying herself for once. It was nice to watch.

The days went by without much really happening, slowly and leisurely. But the peace and quiet didn't last. It wasn't until Saturday night, before they left for home, that the peace had finally been disturbed.

**|Raven|**

The day had passed by too quickly in Ravens opinion. This weekend had by far been the best one of her summer, and she found herself doing something she hadn't done for a long, long time. She was relaxing, and trusting these people who she was happy to say were new friends of hers. Even though she found Bastina to be intolerable at time, she and Thomas were wonderful friends to have.

The night had fallen quickly on that Saturday they were in the woods. The day had been passed talking about skills and opinions on different things. Raven even discovered that Thomas shared the same opinion as her and Finnick about the games; however Bastina seemed not to see anything wrong with them. They excused her ignorance because she was so naïve.

They let the fire die down and began to get ready to go to bed. Raven excused herself beforehand, feeling like she just needed to climb a tree and get some privacy. As much as she likes these people, she did feel a little suffocated. She climbed a tree, tucking the hunter's knife she still carried on her securely in her pocket and sat on a sturdier branch of the tree. She stared up at the sky and closed her eyes, breathing in the night air. She didn't stay long, however, because she didn't want to worry the others. However once she returned to the camp, she realised that she was probably the last of their worries at the moment.

The camp had been upturned. In it, along with her friends, were four other boys, all of them significantly larger than her friends. Over near the edge of the camp where the path to the water pond was, Finnick was wrestling with a boy who had shaggy black hair, managing to hold him off. Bastina was screaming as one boy chased her up a tree and tried to follow her, and Thomas had a stick in his hand and was trying to fight off another boy with curly auburn hair, but Raven could see that the battle was going south for him. The last boy was walking around the fire, picking through their stuff. Raven was furious at this sight of this, they attacked them to try and loot them! The nerve of them! The larger boy stepped away from the fire and stepped backwards towards the woods where Raven was hiding, and she soundlessly slipped out from behind the tree that she was hiding behind and stood on her tiptoes looking at his back. She took one hand off of her hunters knife and jabbed her finger into his shoulder, finding his pressure point and dropping him to his knees in front of her. She wasted no time twisting one of his hands behind his back, and carefully sliding a knife in front of his throat.

**|Finnick|**

Finnick was still not sure how it happened. Raven got up and left the camp and all was quiet like before. But not for long. All of a sudden, four figures sprung out of the trees, one of them wrestling Finnick to the ground. He responded immediately, pushing the older boy off of him and kneeing him in the groin. The older boy reacted by punching Finnick in the stomach and pinning Finnick once again, but he didn't plan on giving up that easily. He continued to fight with the boy for a few minutes, while the others did god only knows what to his friends. The fight was cut short, however, and Finnick was thankful because he was beginning to get tired, when a voice rang clear across the battle ground. Everyone paused, and there was silence. Finnick rolled his head over to locate the source of the noise, and found it was Raven.

Only this wasn't Raven. Whatever shine was usually in her eyes was gone, replaced by a cold blackness, making her look somewhat soulless. The firelight casted an eerie glow on her face, and more particularly, the face of the attacker's leader, who she had on his knees with a knife to his throat. Even though Finnick stood about a few inches taller than her, he would have cowered if she gave him that look. Finnick struggled to get up, but the older boy sensed his movement and pinned him even harder.

"What an interesting development this is." She said simply. She looked around the clearing at the three boys, hatred burning in her eyes, her accent making her sound all the more terrifying. "I suppose you think this is funny. But the jokes over. As you can see, your friend here has gotten himself into a sticky situation due to his carelessness. Now, your all going to do what I tell you to, or I'll cut his throat and bleed him like a stuck pig, do you understand me?" she hissed, looking at their attackers. The one standing below Bastinas tree scoffed,

"You're just a kid, you won't kill him."

"We're here to train for the games aren't we? Last I heard throat slitting happened quiet often during the games, so it would be nice if I could test out my skills." Finnick didn't think for a second she was joking.

"What if we told the counsellor? They'd kick you out" the same boy stated.

"What are you going to tell him? You got beat up by a thirteen year old girl? That'll sound nice won't it?" The older boy treid to retort, but came up blank and seemed to falter and lose his bravado. But Raven wasn't finished speaking. "But since I'm already talking to you, you'll go first. Back away from the tree and let my friend get down. The boy seemed to want to protest, but when he looked at her he lowered his head defeated and did as she said. Raven then turned her attention to the on top of Finnick.

"Get off and go stand by your buddy."

"No." he answered simply. She didn't respond, but without braking eye contact she slowly began moving the knife back and forth across her victim's throat, opening a small cut that blood began trickling out of. Her hostage stiffened underneath of her and hissed at his counterpart,

"Move dumbass!" His friend didn't question him and moved to stand over by his friend. Finnick took this opportunity to scramble to his feet. Raven turned her attention to the one by Thomas.

"You know the drill." The boy looked at the ground and shuffled over to his friends. She spoke again, "Now all three of you. Run, run, run, as fast as you can, just like your gingerbread men." She smirked at them. "Your friend will be along in a minute." With that, the boys left. Raven made the last one stand up, empty his pockets, and they sent him on his, but not without one swift kick in the groin. Once he was gone, Finnick, Thomas and Bastina all turned wide eyed to Raven, who looked at her shoes and blushed profusely.

"Where did you learn to do that?! Oh my god that was amazing!" Bastina shrieked.

"Ya it was, really. Thanks." Thomas whispered, still clearly shaken by the incident. Finnick didn't know what to say. He stared at her for a minute, and was momentarily ashamed that she didn't cross his mind once during the fight, but reminded himself that at the time he had had bigger fish to fry. The display was overall amazing, but his pride wouldn't let him say it out loud. So he decided upon a snarky remark instead.

"Not too shabby," he smirked, throwing his arm around her shoulder. She looked away, either ashamed or embarrassed by what she did, "but I've seen better." He whispered.

"Of course you have." She said throwing his arm off, "You're just lucky showed up," she taunted, "he was getting ready to kick your ass!"

"Ah, I coulda taken him."

"Sure." Sure she answered sarcastically. Bastina continued to ramble on for the next little while about what Raven had done, but it was clear that Raven just wanted to go to sleep. So Finnick left her be, and Thomas, being Thomas, didn't say anything and probably wouldn't have anyways. Eventually, once Bastina's chatter died down, Finnick drifted off to sleep as well, and somewhere in the middle of his dreams, a blonde haired black eyed girl worked her way into his dreams.

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**'A blonde haired black eyed girl worked her way into his dreams...' I just had to put that there, I don't know why! I felt like we needed some violence of some sort considering we were at chapter nine and there had been none yet. Sorry for the longness, though, but it was sooo fun to write :) Anyways, read and review s'il vous plait!**

**~LinneaPike  
**


	10. Reaping Day

**Sorry for the wait, I was kind of draggin my feet with this chapter since my laptop is being wierd and not connecting to the internet. Anyways, here we go!**

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**|Raven|**

Raven may still have been in shock when she woke up the next morning. She may still have been in shock when they packed up. She was having a hard time believing what she had done to that boy, and the worst part was, the feeling that she wouldn't have had a problem slitting his throat right there. She felt tainted and ashamed.

Bastina kept babbling on the next morning about what had happened the night before, but no amount of death glares the others would shoot her way would make her stop talking. They woke up with the sun that Sunday, and packed all of their stuff up to bring back with them. Raven wiped the small blood stains off of the knife with a sick feeling in her stomach, and thought about how the blood had slowly trickled down the front of his neck. She would never look at taking a life the same way again, she knew that for sure. Once they were done packing up and stamping out there fire, they followed the map that had led them to their campsite back to where the group had met up, like they had been told to.

When all of the kids from the training center were in the clearing, they headed back towards he District. Raven and her group were happy that they didn't see the group of boys that had attacked them the previous night, because they didn't want to have to endure that awkward situation. They made it back to the training center by about one thirty.

The rest of the next week seemed to fly by in a flash. Bastina, Thomas, Finnick and Raven soon became inseparable. Finnick, yes, still talked to his old group of friends, but aside from that the four now did most everything together, from training to wandering around the district, to occasionally pushing the other off the dock, much to the amusement of the others. However it seemed the summer seemed to fly by all too fast, because before any of them knew it, it was reaping day.

Raven was home that morning. She hadn't spoken to Bastina (who now considered Raven to be her best friend, and much to Ravens displeasure, she had begun to consider her a friend as well,) at all the previous day, or Thomas, or Finnick. Her nerves were running on an all-time high, because this was technically her first year of Reaping, since she'd been sick last year. Not only that, but now she had three new friends to worry about along with herself which was why she kind of missed not having friends a little, because when you have no friends, you only have to worry about yourself. Not that she would trade any of them for the world, of course.

It was ten o'clock. Reaping didn't start until one o'clock. Raven had already made breakfast for her mom, so she was safe from her for a while. She pulled out a box from underneath of her bed, it was cardboard and white, and inside was a beautiful white and black dress with a pair of white flats and a white headband with a black flower. The dress fell to her knees and hugged her in the middle, with a black ribbon around the waist. She brushed her hair out and let it hang down behind her shoulders. It was an outfit her father had sent her. She finished it off with a necklace her father had bought her for Christmas when she was ten. It was gold and had two silver and gold circles hanging from it, and although it didn't match her dress perfectly, she wore it as a god luck charm.

It was twenty five after twelve when Raven told her mom she was leaving the house, but her mother really didn't acknowledge her leaving so she made it out without any casualties. She took the walk into town and went a bit faster than usual because although this was her first reaping she knew what happened when one failed to show up. She was about ten minutes from the town when she heard a voice from behind her,

"Raven!" She turned to see Bastina running up towards her, but surprisingly no Thomas. "How's it going? I'm so, so, so, so nervous!" Raven noted the girl didn't look very nervous, but humored her none the less.

"So am I, it's a nerve wracking time." Bastina simply replied with a vigorous nod of her head, mentioning somewhere in the middle that Thomas had left ahead of her. Raven did what she usually did and tuned out Bastina, and when they finally arrived at the square they were some of the last to check in. Bastina ran ahead of Raven, jumping three spots in line to sign in and run off to her spot, she was so excited; Raven had just signed in and had turned around to leave, when she found herself face to face with a stunningly familiar set of sea green eyes.

"Excited?" Finnick asked her.

"Hardly," she replied looking up at him. He seemed to see the truth in her eyes.

"Hey," he said slinging an arm around her shoulder, "No worries, it's gonna be fine."

"Ya, ya," she replied shrugging off his arm, "listen, good luck but I gotta go. See you after reaping?" She asked him hopefully.

"Ya," he said sincerely, "I'll see you later. Just try not to miss me too much, k?" With that, he walked off, and was joined by another boy. Raven rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to herself, and found the thirteen year old section. She stood there quietly not far from a girl she recognized from school (but didn't particularly like so she kept quiet). The reaping started not long afterwards.

It started with a few Capitol officials taking the stage, followed by the mayor, a line of District fours nine Victors. Even if they're a career district, they have the least amount of victors from all three career districts. Either way, the last one to take the stage was there escort Navi Kelloy . It's an odd name, even for a Capitolite, but she bears it well. She is sporting somewhat normal hair, choppy and shoulder length however it was a bright shade of bubble gum blue, she wore a matching blue dress and high heel pumps. She was all filled with vigor, and marched right up to the mic after the presentation, and started,

"Well, well, well, what a good looking bunch we have here!" She said, receiving most of the crowds applause and a few whoops of approval. "Now, now, let's not waste any time! Let's get to the girls first, mix things up a little!" Raven could feel herself shaking a little when Navi stepped up to the bowl and drew a name. She promptly made her way back to the mic and read the name out loud, with some difficulty,

"Oh, an interesting name this is! Rave, um Raveni?" Ravens heart stopped. It must be hers. How many other people have a screwed up name with Raven in it like her? But Navi finally got it right, "Oh goodness me, my bad, Ravine Sandpiper." Raven let out a sigh of relief. That was definitely the most terrifying thing that had ever happened to her. She hardly even payed attention to Navi when she drew the boy's name, but there was no mistaking it when it rang out clear over the crowd,

"Finnick Odair!"

Correction. This was the most terrifying thing that had ever happened to her. She watched in horror as one of the first real friends she had ever made bounded up onto the stage in fake bravado. She was frozen. She didn't say anything, didn't move, clap or cheer when she announced their names, only kept her eyes glued on Finnick and at one point he made eye contact with her and for a split second and she saw her own emotions reflected in them. Fear, doubt, but a split second later it was gone. They were ushered into the Justice Building for the goodbyes, and Raven pushed her way out of the crowd to go and see him.

**|Finnick|**

Finnick sat in the room in the Justice Building in shock. His mother had come in and cried for her son, she had hugged him and held him and he wanted to cry too, seeing her like this, but all he could do were make promises that he would come home. His time with his mom had passed all too quickly and eventually she was escorted from the room by a Peacekeeper. Thomas had also come in with Bastina, but she once again did not understand, while Thomas however was quieter than usual. They left not long afterwards however, and he was left with Geoff standing in front of him.

"Guess things worked out after all, eh?" Finnick was silent. "Don't be like that," he said frowning, "once you get back we'll be rich!" Finnick looked at him in disgust, standing up. Geoff should know better than to piss him off.

" 'we'll be rich'?" Finnick repeated, "Are you fucking kidding me? You're a dumbass, you know?' Finnick began to raise his voice a little, 'You don't get it! You don't get that this isn't just a game! Are you too dense to realize there are twenty three other people out there who already want me dead?! DEAD Geoff! Not unconscious, no longer BREATHING! Get the Fuck out of here!" Geoff looked thoroughly offended, but confused all the while.

"Fine, whatever!" He said, turning to leave. However before he opened the door he paused, "Hey, who's that blond chick you've been hanging out with lately?"

"Raven?" Finnick replied, confused.

"Raven, huh… You, you with her?" Geoff's choice of words enraged Finnick.

"No, I am not 'with her', but if you go anywhere near her I will skin you!"

"Well she's kind of pretty... And if you don't come back..." he said smirking evilly, and Finnick reached his boiling point. He reached over to the table next to him and grabbed a colored vase, whipping it at Geoff's head. Geoff narrowly dodged it, and slipped out of the room cursing. Then, when Finnick looked back up, standing in the doorway, was Raven. She wasn't crying, or sad, she looked almost as if this was just one unfortunate coincidence. She turned her head to the floor, looking at the shattered pieces of the vase.

"Tut, tut, we really should be controlling that temper once we get to the Capitol." she said disapprovingly, but unable to put any humor into it. She looked up at Finnick and he saw the scared look in her eyes, most likely a look reflected in his own. He didn't like seeing her scared, because that was one thing she never allowed herself to be. Finnick didn't say a word, but wrapped her into a huge hug instead. Instead of coolly brushing him off, she hugged him back, tightly.

"I'm not afraid." He said simply, as if saying out loud could make it true.

"I know." She said simply. He hugged her tighter, but she pulled away and looked at him. "I know because I know you, and I know you can do it, okay? You've trained for this Finnick, you may never have wanted to be in the games but you're ready for it, which is why you don't need to be afraid. You've got people to come home to." He would be forever grateful to her for this, because she was so calm, and so strong and that was what he needed right now, not for someone to weep like he's dead, but for someone to at least act like he can do it.

"Okay," he whispered, and they fell in to momentary silence.

"But that was close, hey? Ravine, Raven, I thought she was going to say my name for a second."

"I don't even want to think about that." Finnick replied back honestly. They fell into silence again.

"So, what's your token?" she asked

"I'm sorry?"

"You're Token. The one thing from home you can take into the arena with you, if it's not a weapon."

"Oh. Well no, I don't have one."

"Good, I was hoping you wouldn't because I want to give you this, you know, if you want it." She said shyly, unclasping a circular necklace from around her neck. "I'd like you to take this with you, if you want it." When Finnick saw the necklace he pulled her into another hug and whispered,

"Of course I'll take it."

"Good." She replied. "But I hope you know I expect it back!" She told him sternly. Finnick actually laughed, amazingly.

"Alright, but-" Finnick's words were cut off by a peacekeeper opening the door and telling Raven to leave.

"Okay," she told him, walking out. However before she did so, she surprised him by doing something he didn't expect. She stood on her tiptoes and craned her neck, giving him a small kiss on his cheek, then looked him in the eyes and said, "Good luck Finnick." And with that, she was gone, leaving behind her a thoroughly confused Finnick Odair.

**|Raven|**

Raven didn't know this feeling. She didn't understand it, because she had never felt this before. It wasn't anger or sadness, but… Loss? She knew she had never really lost someone before, because she had never been close to anyone, except for one friend she had when she was a kid named Dominic, but she hadn't seen him in years.

She left the reaping that day completely out of it, not even bothering to look for Thomas and Bastina afterwards, but just running home with a tornado of confusing emotions swirling around inside her poor little head. She was in such a daze for the rest of the afternoon; she hardly even registered her mother when she beat her for dropping an egg on the floor when she hastily tried to prepare a mediocre omelet, messing up the ingredients and very nearly burning them. She spent the rest of her evening wandering about her room, still in shock from the day's events, and before she knew it the sun had set, and the clock in the kitchen read twelve o'clock. So she slipped outside and walked barefoot through the grass, over to the fence and into the woods. She sat down on her clearing and began thinking.

So many thoughts went racing through her mind. Why had she kissed him? She'd had no intention too. It just kind of happened. And why did bad things always seem to happen to her? Why did it have to be Finnick going to the Capitol? She wondered if he was in the Capitol yet, and how he liked things. She certainly didn't like things right now and she was scared for him. She figured that deep down, even though he didn't want to show it, he was probably scared too. She thought about how she didn't want to lose her closest friend, how much she missed him already. However we must remember that thoughts like this are taxing on the mind of a young girl, even one as emotionally mature as young Raven, and eventually she felt a tear trickle down her face. She quickly wiped it away, but another came to take its place, then another, and another. Eventually she found herself curled into a ball in the middle of the woods, sobbing like a three year old because she was in the midst of learning how unfair life was. The world around her seem to blur as her eyes were clouded by tears and confusion. However, at same point in the midst of all this, a red fox with one brown paw poked his nose out of the bushes and curled up to her side, sensing her sadness.

She stayed out in the woods for a long time. Eventually, when she had cried all her tears and then some, she shakily stood up and made her way home. And once there, she cried some more.

**I'm sorry that was such an unhappy ending, but it had to be done. Raise your hands if you feel bad for her! I just raised mine. And has anyone made the connection between the fox Raven is meeting and the fox Finnick wrote that poem about in like, chapter four or something? Anyways, love you all!**

**~LinneaPike**

**|PS| To my wonderful guest reviewer I had, yes, if the story doesn't crash and burn, this will most likely be a multi book story. **

**|PPS| This is like the fourth time that I updated this chapter, because I realized that I accidentally gave Raven and Ravine the same last name. Ooops! My bad. I also corrected the argument between Geoff and Finnick AGAIN because it just never sounds right to me :P Promise I'll update for real again soon!  
**


	11. Chariot Rides and Train Rides

**Heeeeeeey OKAY! That was a ludicrously long time to wait for an update! I'm so so sorry there was christmas and then school started. But you guys are too awesome for my excuses. So anyways, he name of the Chapter probably makes it pretty self-explanatory as to what's in this one. Alors, lisez!**

* * *

**|Finnick|**

* * *

The train was full of chatter as it pulled out of the station and headed for the Capitol. Finnick's district partner, Ravine, was a tall auburn haired seventeen year old who was as in love with the games as one could be. She talked animatedly with the other victors who had the same opinion as her on the games, while Finnick helped himself to some of the desserts that were available and sat down on a chair in a seating area with some other victors who were slightly more disinterested in the games.

The first Victor to greet him was named Magdalène Agua, but she insisted upon calling herself Mags. Finnick liked this shorter alternative better, because her full name was a mouthful. She was an elderly woman of seventy-two, quiet, and you could still see parts of her white hair had some black in it. The next was a young man of maybe eighteen named Desmond Schooner informed him that he would be his main mentor for his 'stay' in the Capitol. Desmond had longer curly hair that was a light, soft reddish/brownish color, and soft green eyes. He had won the 63rd games two years. A few others introduced themselves, but they didn't make as big of an impression on Finnick as the first two.

The train ride to the Capitol was only maybe ten hours long. If Finnick had been traveling there under any less grim circumstances, he would have been more excited than he was now. Not that Finnick believed he couldn't do it, he was just very well aware of the odds. He reckoned he would probably be one of the few 'career tributes' that fully understood them. And then one thing dawned on him. He had never really considered being a career tribute. There should be a spot for him if he were to show them his skills, but did he really want to go down that road? It would certainly heighten his chance of survival, plus he was positive that Ravine would be all over that. He would have to see what the tributes were like this year first, however it would be about another hour before they could watch the recaps because of all of the different time zones in the various districts.

Finnick stood up and excused himself so he could go to his room to wash up. All lies, however, what he really wanted were some privacy. Thankfully he was granted it, and upon arriving at his room was amazed at the lavishness of it. If things in District four were supposed to be nice, this place was an absolute haven.

He threw himself face first onto his bed and let out a groan. He was definitely not looking forward to what was to come. But his father had always told him that 'Optimism is the best way to see life', so he supposed he should think optimistically. The games couldn't be that bad. I mean, he was a career was he not? Plus since he was confident in his abilities, it wasn't like this was a death sentence. Unless he got too careless. But he wasn't going to think about whether or not he would die. He would think of this as an experience. Yes, whether or not he felt good about this, it would be an _experience._

He sighed and rolled himself off of his bed and decided to get changed into something more comfortable (jeans and a tee-shirt), but he found when he was changing that something was pulling at his neck, and when he reached for it his hands clasped around something circular and he immediately recalled what it was; Ravens necklace.

He sat down on his bed and finished pulling his shirt over his head, then sighed. He was supposed to meet her after the reaping. "Guess this kind of threw a wrench into our plans, didn't it?" he thought to himself, and subconsciously found himself rubbing the side of his cheek where she had kissed him. He had already been shocked about being reaped for the games , but that just completely threw him off balance. "_She_ kissed _me_." He thought. She must have been more terrified than she had let on to do something like that, but his mind was in too much of a mess to figure out something like that. Even in his right state of mind, he found that thinking of her was difficult because he never really knew what to think when he thought of her. But then one memory in particular came back to him; Geoff. What he had said about her still made him boil, but he had to trust that she could take care of herself until he got back, (remember that optimism we talked about?) because when he did, if Geoff said one thing about her he'd beat him till he finally resembled the piece of shit he truly is. He then decided it would be best if he just stopped all thoughts in general, so he lay down on his bed and decided he'd take a nap.

o-+-o-+-o-+-o-+-o-+-o-+-o

Finnick woke up when he heard his escort rapping her hands against his bedroom door and calling him for supper. So he crawled out of bed and arranged himself as best he could, then left his room for supper.

When he entered the room he took a seat across from Ravine and began eating from the plate that was in front of him. He was still somewhat drowsy form the nap he'd taken and stifled a yawn as he pulled his chair towards the table, and Ravine picked her head up to look at him then smiled brightly,

"Hello! I'm Ravine! You're Finnick right? Nice to meet you! Happy Hunger Games!" Finnick had some difficulty absorbing this all at once, but smiled back none the less and managed to reply back smoothly,

"The pleasures all mine." The rest of the meal continued in chatter, Ravine talked animatedly with Navi, and Finnick exchanged a few words with Desmond who was sitting on his left. When the meal was over a group of avoxs came over and cleared the table, while Desmond, Navi, and Ravines mentor, Sapphire, led them to a sitting room where they could watch the recaps.

District one and two, obviously very intimidating. From one there was a tall boy named Pluto Greenwhich. He was seventeen, the same age as Ravine, but he was muscly and had shaggy blonde hair that fell in front of his eyes. His District Partner was a sixteen year old girl who volunteered name Topaz Ora, who like her District Partner, also had blond hair, but hers fell down her back in golden waves.

District two was more of the same, really. The female tribute was another volunteer. She was a tall girl with shoulder length black hair named Orchid, who, surprisingly enough, stepped out of the fifteen year old division. Her District partner was surprisingly very young, and named Denver Hyla. He was a fourteen year old but was big, roughly the same size as Finnick.

District three passed by without anything interesting, a scrawny fifteen year old girl and a weedy eighteen year old boy. Then came District four, and Finnick watched as Ravine made her way up onto the stage, refusing to allow volunteers. Then came Finnick, and he took the stage grinning. Finnick felt like an ass looking at himself on the stage but had to remind himself it was all for show.

Districts five and six showed no competition at all, while district seven produced a rather large eighteen year old who looked just about as bloodthirsty as a career. Eight, nine, no one of concern, but Finnick felt a tug at his heart when he saw a little blond girl from ten with two pig tails on top of her head get reaped alongside of a Humongous sixteen year old. The little girl's name was Melody. Finnick tuned out of the rest of the reaping after that, knowing that eleven and twelve wouldn't be anyone worth watching anyways.

Finnick got up and excused himself to go wander around the train for a while. He had time, they wouldn't get to the capitol until ten o'clock, maybe ten thirty and it was only seven now. He ate a few cupcakes since he hadn't had one in a while and watched some of the landscape go by, feeling positive that at one point off in the distance he'd seen the shining lights of either District one or two. He wondered what his family and friends were up to right now, and even though of some of his devoted followers. He assumed his mom would be home now, crying her eyes out. He wished he could comfort her. He guessed that Thomas and Bastina would have probably walked home in silence, because Bastina had looked a little lost when they had come to say goodbye. Then he hoped that Raven was doing okay, and found himself absentmindedly tugging on the necklace she had given him. She was such a calming presence, he found himself missing her most already. However he had to remind himself that he didn't want her here because that would mean she was in the games. Around nine, he retired to his room for a while until Navi came and called him.

They were in the Capitol.

-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o

"There!" Damon said, "You look splendid! I haven't had a such a good looking tribute to work with in ages!" Finnick wasn't quite sure what to say to that, but assumed it was a compliment so he smiled. Damon was his stylist. He was a colorful man of maybe his early or mid-thirties, with electric blue hair and dark, dark, dark skin. Overall, Finnick had to say he the most normal looking Capitolite he had ever seen. However, every now and then Damon would say something so, well Capitol, he would want to rip his ears off, but Finnick got the feeling that deep down he had a genuinely good heart.

Finnick turned around and looked at himself in the mirror. There was no denying he looked amazing (but Finnick thought that he was pretty good looking to begin with, so…). He wasn't wearing a shirt, but a set of deep blue swimming trunks. No shoes either. The only other thing he had was a golden trident to hold while on the Chariot. It had sapphires and diamonds around the bottom of it and they were arranged in a triangle near the place were all three points of the trident protruded from the hilt. Whenever Damon asked him if he thought the costume was too exciting he had to suppress the urge to laugh, but he smiled and nodded appreciatively none the less. Damon looked up at Finnick and said,

"There's just one last thing I want to add, if, you want it, of course." He reached in his pocket and pulled something out, then held it out in the palm of his hand. It was Raven's necklace. "We took it at the remake center, but I thought it would be nice to wear your token with your chariot outfit." He gave it back to Finnick and he thanked Damon honestly, and clipped the necklace around his neck, feeling just a little less nervous.

Once they were done, Finnick was guided down to a big open area filled with chariots. He walked over to find the District four one, and was moments later joined by Ravine, who was dressed in a type of mermaid suit that did make her look very beautiful. She, however, looked a little ruffled as she leaned up against the chariot.

"My stylist," she said with a huff, "is a complete idiot! She will not stop speaking for more than like, two seconds! It's _so_ annoying!" Finnick thought how very hypocritical she was being, but didn't mention it.

"I can see how that would get annoying. My costumes a little bland, I find. But I like yours."

"Thank you, but don't be ridiculous. The Capitol wants to see you without a shirt on, you're only fourteen and you're the second best looking tribute here. Behind myself of course. Why, if you were eighteen I wouldn't be able to keep my hands off you." She said simply looking around. Finnick looked at her strangely, because, well that's a strange thing to tell someone.

"uh…thanks." He replied uncertainly. A few seconds later, a trainer came in and told them to mount there chariots because they would pull out in approximately 45 seconds. So the two of them mounted the chariot and right on schedule, they were off. Finnick heard the crowd scream when District one entered. Then they screamed a little bit louder when two came in. The shouts died down a little bit for three, but when Finnick and Ravine rolled out, the crowd went a-wall. There were shrieks and screams and people shouting his name, so he smiled and lifted the trident above his head, grinning. He must admit, it was nice to hear crowds screaming his name. But the ride was over as quickly as it had begun, and soon they were in front of the presidents mansion. He gave them a speech, welcoming them to the Capitol, but all Finnick could hear in his head was what the President actually means,

_"Tributes! How's it going? Ready to die! I hope It's gruesome! Have a nice rest of your life. Sincerely, President Snow."_

The Chariot pulled into a smaller room where they disembarked, and Finnick and Ravine but mostly Finnick) were congratulated by their mentors, stylists, and Navi for making a brilliant show. They didn't hang around long, however, because it was late and they needed there rest for tomorrow. So Finnick went up to his room and changed out of the swim trunks and into a normal pair of underwear (leaving on Ravens necklace so as not to lose it), and slowly but surely, fell asleep.

* * *

**Whooo! Chariot rides and train rides! I had fun calling Ravines stylist a idiot, because I like calling people that! Anyways, I'm going to go to bed now because I finished editing this at like, 10:30! Night night, sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite!  
**

**PS:: It might be a whie until my next update, I have exams this month :S  
**

**~LinneaPike**


	12. Training: Day 1

**Ya I know, this is late, but I finally finished it! Curse you writers block, cuuuuuuuuuuuurse you….**

* * *

**|Finnick| **

Finnick had slept uneasily the night before. Many times he had woken up thinking it was finally morning, only to realise it had just been an hour. All of his senses were on overdrive, whenever a floorboard creaked he prepared for impact, and a secret paranoia had begun to set inside his head. There was still a week or so until the games and he was already on high alert.

Finally when it was time to get up he did so slowly, changing into the training outfit that had been left on his bed. It was a simple outfit, black, with blue here and there and with his district number tattooed on the back. He left his room for breakfast.

Finnick had woken up before Ravine, so him and Desmond ate breakfast with only Navi, Falisha (Ravines stylist), and Damon for company. Needless to say, the overwhelming amount of stupid in the room had begun to wear on Desmond and Finnick by the time Ravine woke up. Not that adding her to the party made the conversation any more intelligent. So, twenty long minutes later, the two of them were on their way down to the training center. Desmond had pulled Finnick aside before they had left, however, to talk to him.

'Do you have any sort of plan at all for today? Because you need to have one' he asked him concernedly

'Well, I-'

'Ya, I didn't think so." He cut him off, 'But you're a smart kid Finnick, I know that. Just remember that you're from District four, Finnick. The careers _will_ approach you and Ravine. She'll say yes, doesn't take a genius to figure that out. Just remember what the careers really are no matter what they come off as being, okay? I legitimately think you can win this despite you're age, plus I kind of bet my favorite shirt on you winning.'

'Oh, well that's nice. I don't know, I guess it feels sort of morally wrong to join them, but, this really isn't a game where ones morals can stay intact. I don't know, I suppose if they ask me I'll say yes, there's no point in refusing a ticket to at least the final twelve, probably eight.'

'Okay then, good lad!' Desmond replied proudly, leaving Finnick to go down to the training room.

**-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-**

Once Finnick was done listening to Atalas speech about the rules, he took a quick look around him a started right for the trident section of the center. He picked up the one that reminded him most of the ones back home, turned it around in his hand and whipped it at the target behind him. It was a perfect hit, but it narrowly missed the head of the tribute girl from District 11, and even though he mouthed 'sorry' to her, she clearly didn't think he was and shot him a withering glare then turned and marched away. Finnick couldn't help but laugh as he walked towards the dummy to pull it out and inspect his work. A fine hit it was, however Finnick was careful to back out of the way when the dummy began to spray fake blood. It was an interesting effect. Finnick turned back towards where he had been standing before and took a look around the room. On one side there was a booth, higher up in the wall that the game makers could watch them from. On the other side, closer to him, there was an identical booth where many of the victors who still cared sat and observed the tributes as well. Finnick spotted Desmond up there, chatting with another victor who looked absolutely and completely wasted*. Finnick sighed, and went back to throwing his tridents, but not ten minutes later, he felt someone standing behind him, so he stopped and turned his head ever so slightly in their direction.

'Wow,' she said, whoever it was, 'You're good at that.'

'I am, aren't I?' he replied turning around. He wasn't sure where that reply had come from, but he guessed that he sort of liked it. When he turned around, he found that he was face to face with Orchid, the fifteen year old from two whom, he noted, had very blue eyes.

'So, I'm Orchid McQuarrie, district 2.' She said, extending a hand to him. He didn't really want to shake it, but figured it would be best not to upset her. It's always the sweet ones that are the most unstable.

'Finnick Odair.' He replied smirking. 'Four.' Orchid gave a smile.

'Can you do that again?' she asked, batting her eyelashes and giggling a bit. Finnick had dealt with these types of girls before.

'I guess,' he replied, making eye contact and reaching for another trident. He noticed that he really hadn't flirted with anyone for a while, ever since maybe a month before he games. Finnick picked up a steel trident, weighed it in his hand momentarily, and whipped it at a dummy. When he turned back to face Orchid, he noticed that she had been more so staring at the muscles in his arms that the actual trident itself. 'Oh well,' he thought, 'let her stare.'

'Wow…' she breathed, trailing off a bit. But she came too after a few seconds, smiling at him. 'So, my friends over there, we were, um, wondering if you'd like to join our alliance, being as you're so good at those trident thingies and all.' So it turned out Desmond was right. He looked over at the table she had gestured too, and saw Pluto and Topaz from one, Denver from two, and even Ravine. 'Geez', he thought, 'These guys aren't wasting _any_ time.' He looked back at Orchid and considered it, then smirked at her.

'Sure, why not.' He answered. She seemed delighted by his reply, because she giggled and told him,

'Great! That's just what I wanted to hear!' And then grabbed his wrist and pulled him across the room to the table where the others were sitting, and sat him down next to her and across from Ravine. 'So,' she started, 'everyone this is Finnick from four!' Then she went around the table and introduced him to everyone sitting at the table, even though he knew all of their names already.

So, they spent the rest of the day scouting around and looking at the tributes, pointing out who was weak and testing anyone who wanted to be in their alliance. Nobody passed this test. Finnick had to say, he felt like a bit of an ass hole doing this, but he knew that this alliance had been handed to him on a silver platter and that he couldn't afford to mess this up. However, heckling innocent tributes wasn't the least of his troubles, because by the time the day had ended he had never been as sick of someone before as he was of Orchid McQuarrie. When they would split into pairs to scout for tributes, she would immediately pair with him. When they would eat lunch, she was right by his side. Although he tried his best to hide his annoyance at this, he later found out he had failed miserably. Later that night when leaving the training center and stopping to let District two out, Ravine put her head down and laughed, and Finnick was surprised because it wasn't a giggly sort of ditzy laugh, it was an _I-just-figured-out-the-hidden-meaning-behind-this_ laugh which was strange because Finnick was doubtful she could even read. He looked up at her, curious, and asked,

'What?'

'Nothing,' she said, still laughing under her breath. 'It's just; I think you might have a fan'

'Oh really, I hadn't noticed.' He replied sarcastically.

'Ya,' she replied, suddenly growing serious. 'I don't know what kind of game she's playing though, or if she maybe legitimately thinks two can come out of this game. Just be careful Finnick. I'd rather not see my only District partner die a stupid and preventable death.' Finnick didn't say anything, because he was still too confused at what she was saying (or at least the intelligence level of it). She looked at him and let out a breathy laugh, shaking her head. 'Are you surprised? I bet you're wondering what happened to stupid little Ravine, but, I prefer to live life having people believe I'm stupid. It's easier that way, because it makes me the least likely suspect in most anything so I can do a lot more things without getting caught. It's worked wonderfully so far.' They reached there floor and the doors opened. 'Goodnight, Finnick.' She said, stepping out and into the apartment.

**o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+**

**And that would be chapter 12! I really don't have an excuse for this, other than the fact that exams and a serious case of writers block halfway through this chapter sort of got in the way. :P Either way, I hope you all liked it. I was sort of getting bored of the stupid Ravine character so I decided to give her some depth. Some feedback on what you think of her would really be greatly appreciated; I'm still a bit unsure about her so ya. Either way, keep smiling ^_^**

**~LinneaPike**

***** Guess who that drunken victor Desmond was talking to was XD**


	13. Training: Part 2

**HELOOOO! Well my pretty little readers, how are you? I wish I were updating faster, but oh well! My friend lent me her copy of tLoZ wind waker :3 hehehehehehe…. Mildly addicted! Either way, I really hope I find a way to put a little bit of Raven into this one, I must say I missed her in the last one. So, I hope to god this chapter isn't as crappy as the last one, alors, lisez!**

**o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o**

**|Finnick|**

To say the least, Finnick had to say that the next few days of training weren't as tedious as the first one. By the third day, Finnick had successfully found a way to avoid Orchid a little bit, making his life much easier.

Finnick also made sure to keep an eye on Ravine. Ever since he had found out that her brain was much more developed than that of the average bunny rabbit, he wanted to know just exactly what it was she was up to. She may be his district partner, but he still wanted to win. He had also decided not to tell Desmond about her secret, feeling like she had trusted him enough to let only him know.

He also noticed that Pluto **(D1)** had sort of assumed command of the career pack. Everyone just seemed to listen to him, and while Finnick didn't exactly like following orders, her figured that since this boy was a trained killer, he should just go with the flow. However the alliance itself still concerned Finnick, because he was absolutely positive he didn't want to be a part of it, but he knew that winning this game would prove to be much more of a challenge without Career supplies.

He was also glad, to say the least, that the career group wasn't as tight as it had been the first day. This allowed him a lot more time to move around to the different stations that there were available, but all of the necessary ones for survival (fire starting, knot tying,), Finnick found weren't that difficult to pick up anyways. However while he was over at the knot tying station, he was reminded of when he had first shown Raven how to tie knots, and found himself absentmindedly tying a net. God he missed home.

He still spent most of his time at the spear station, because that was where they kept the tridents. Not that that was where he spent all of his time though, but he spent a fair deal of it there. He spent a fair bit of time observing the other tributes as well.

Ravine, he noticed, could not be separated from her bow and arrow, while both Denver and Pluto used short and long swords (respectively). Topaz, to say the least, proved to be much more bloodthirsty that he had originally given her credit for. After seeing her behead and slash open a few dummies with a sickle, he figured it would be best not to get on her bad side. Orchid, on the other hand, used a simple blow gun (and proved to be only somewhat skilled at it). However overall, training went well.

Finnick arrived at the District Four suite after Ravine did, on the night before the individual sessions. He had stayed for an extra while to practice some hand to hand combat with some trainers. He looked around and noticed that Ravine was in a serious conversation with her mentor, Sapphire. Finnick guessed it was likely about the session tomorrow. Finnick didn't bother to hang around in the main area for long, though, because he wanted to go and wash up.

When Finnick stepped into the main room of their apartment again, Desmond immediately called him over.

"Finnick, come here a minute." He stepped down the stairs to where his mentor was sitting on a couch, reading a book called _'A series of unfortunate events'_. Finnick couldn't help but think how perfectly that title suited the circumstances. Desmond put down the book, however, and turned to face Finnick when he sat down across from him. "Have you thought about what you're going to do for your individual session yet?" He asked him.

"Well, you know," Finnick shrugged, "Probably just throw some spears and tridents; tie a net or a few knots. I'm fairly confident in my abilities."

"Alright. You were gonna get a good score anyways, considering they'll still be sober when you enter the training room, but it'd be nice to keep things mildly interesting for them if you could. It might earn you a bonus point."

"Duly noted," he replied, turning to walk away. Desmond called him back.

"Wait a second, get back over here I'm not done with you." Finnick looked back at him and raised an eyebrow, then flopped back into the seat opposite Desmond.

"What?"

"So I've observed over the past few days that you are indeed a part of the career alliance. Am I wrong?"

"Ya, I've been meaning to tell you about that…"

"Mm hmm. I can, however tell, that you hate that. Did you promise someone that you wouldn't?"

"Well… Not really. "He said, thinking of how disappointed his mother and Raven would be. "I'm just not okay with sitting back and being a part of the way they go through the games, if you get what I mean."

"Ya, I think I do" Desmond sighed, "but you need to realize Finnick, one does not simply leave the career alliance. Not with their life at least. You know that, right?"

"Ya, but anything's possible I guess. What I'm trying to say Desmond is that I won't stay with them. I just want their stuff, but I'm not sure how to go about that." He finished.

"Well you'd better figure something out soon. I don't recommend even letting on the slightest hint of what you plan on doing, because you will lose your head so fast, you won't even have time to process running off. You're free to go now." He said. Finnick stood up. "Oh wait! Before you go, just out of curiosity; who did you get that token from? There's no way in hell it's yours." He smirked at him.

"Oh." Finnick replied, thinking back to when Raven had given it to him, "a friend of mine." He answered simply. After that, Finnick sat and relaxed on the couch, trying to think of an interesting way to impress the gamemakers and zoning out for the next little while.

He knew that he would have to use spear and tridents at some point, but that had been done so many times before. His hand absentmindedly reached for the necklace around his neck, and it was then that he remembered when he had shown Raven to make knots. Right there, he now knew what he would do.

Around ten thirty, he retired to his bedroom for some sleep to be rested for tomorrow.

o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o

"Einstein, Tamika."

Finnick, along with all of the other tributes, sat lined up along a bench outside the training room as the other tributes were called one by one. Districts one and two had already been completed, the male for three was done, and scrawny fifteen year old Tamika was the tribute to go right before Finnick. Like her District Partner before her, she didn't take long; fifteen minutes at best. When the robotic voice finally announced Finnicks name, he stood up and entered the room, feeling confident.

Finnick noticed upon entering that there were fewer gamemakers then there had been during the normal training days. Some of the ones from before must have been sponsors. He counted approximately twenty, whereas there had been thirty before. The gamemakers told him to start.

So, he walked over to the knot station, still praying that this would work. He tied a noose. He hung it off of a bar in the middle of the room, and moved a few dummies behind it. He then stood in front of it, and took three spears. He then threw them though the hole of the nose and perfectly onto the target. He turned around, and the gamemakers looked amused, and impressed. Excellent.

Now, for the finale. This was the part where luck would be key. He left the noose where it was, and positioned a dummy do that it was facing the gamemakers, and ran about twenty feet behind it. He spoke some sort of prayer in his head, and threw this time a trident at the dummy, spearing it directly in the back and causing it to fall forward, hook in the noose, and hand suspended from the ceiling for everyone to see.

And that was all he had. He turned to look at the gamemakers, who had a mix of horror and amazement on their faces. Finnick couldn't help but smile. A few gamemakers came down to inspect his work, and they proceeded to dismiss him. Finnick practically ran up to his apartment to tell Desmond all about _what_ he had done. He felt sure he would get a twelve, however unlikely that would be.

Ravine arrived back at their suite about a half an hour after Finnick, looking rather unfazed, making Finnick feel a little stupid for freaking out about how awesome he thought he did. The rest of the day, however, was long because the scores wouldn't be broadcasted for another three hours. So, they relaxed, ate supper, and when six thirty came, they all sat down eagerly in front of the television to hear Ceaser Flickerman announce their scores.

"The scores are as follows!" He announced with a stupid grin.

**D1: Pluto Greenwich-10**

**Topaz Ora- 9**

**D2- Denver Hyla- 9**

**Orchid McQuarrie-8**

**D3- Gadget Wire- 5**

**Tamika Einstein- 4**

**D4-**

Finnick held his breath uneasily,

**Finnick Odair- 10**

Finnick couldn't help but beam stupidly at the television, overjoyed about his score. Although he had been hoping for something legendary, a ten he decided would suffice. 'I guess that means they like my noose' he thought, somewhat evilly. But he turned his attention back to the screen to see what Ravine had gotten

**Ravine Sandpiper- 9**

"A NINE? HOW THE HELL DID YOU GET HIGHER THAN ME?"

**o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+**

**|Raven|**

Raven had stayed home all day that day. She was too nervous to miss the training scores, even if he knew that they, for a fact, did not start until six thirty. She was never usually this invested in the games, but then again, she had never known anyone in them. Her mother had been off doing other things around and outside of the house, and had left Raven by herself for most of the day. It actually made Raven somewhat happy to see that for the first time in months, her mother only had maybe a drink or four in her. Before Raven knew it, it was six thirty and time for the scores to be broadcasted.

**D1: Pluto Greenwich-10**

**Topaz Ora- 9**

**D2- Denver Hyla- 9**

**Orchid McQuarrie-8**

**D3- Gadget Wire- 5**

**Tamika Einstein- 4**

**D4-**

Raven leaned even closer to the television (her face was now only inches from Ceaser Flickermans)

**Finnick Odair- 10**

"YES!" She hollered/cheered. That probably wasn't the best idea, considering her mother was still in the house, and loud noises don't really agree well with her.

"SHUT UP!" She heard her mother holler from the other room, but honestly she was so excited that he hadn't done something stupid and failed miserably that she didn't even care. The only issue was that now she was really curious to know what he did, which sucks because he's four Districts away right now.

'Oh Well,' she thought, 'as long as he doesn't die, he'll be able to tell me.'

* * *

**Shitty ending, know, but I had no idea how to go about that one :P But I got my wish! Raven was in this chapter! You're probably thinking, 'well of course you got your wish silly, you wrote this.' HEHEHE! Ya so I finished wind waker the other day! Had to fight SO hard to not cry my face off at the very end! AH well, what can you do. Thank you to all of my wonderful reviewers, followers, and favritors (?), for keeping this story going, and my guest reviewers as well, I love you guys for reviewing this all of the time!**

**Merci beaucoup!**

**~LinneaPike**

**PS:: was thinking that you guys might be curious about the names of the other tributes. I'm gonna let you know now just to save some time for the future: (order- male, female)**

**D5: Donald Fairweather (16) / Electre Wave (13)**

**D6: Evan O'Leary (16) / Lillia Byway (16)**

**D7: Abrax Maplewood (18)/ Alexa Pine (15)**

**D8: Colby Maronus (15)/ Marissa Satin (16)**

**D9 : Riley Calypso (16)/ Linnea White (17)**

**D10: Ashton Finley (16)/ Melody Belle (12)**

**D11: Rye Green (13)/ Cassie Maris (15)**

**D12 : Gregory Dusty (12)/ Janet Dusty (17) –Yes they are siblings-**


	14. Interviews

**HEY! You all probably hate me for leaving you for like, over two months. BUT my excuse is valid my laptop was down and out for a while, and I just got it fixed. Then I, so I guess that's not really an excuse at all, is it? Then I got really lazy with this chapter so I guess that that's not really not an excuse at all… I was getting chapters out as often as I was before but, turns out writing the games themselves are a lot more fun to plan than they are to write **** What eves, tho, hope you enjoy this! INTERVIEWS! WOOOOOO!**

**o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+**

**|Finnick|**

"My, my, my, my, my! You, know, my own talent never ceases to amaze me! It's wonderful, you know, a talent like mine _finally _being used on a tribute who's actually attractive! Look at yourself! You look wonderful!" Finnick had to say, once again, Damon might have been giving himself a bit too much credit. Designing an outfit for a boy couldn't possibly be that difficult, considering it was really just a tux.

Finnick had actually been with Damon for most of the day. He had showed up at the apartment around noon, two hours early, with a handful of different outfits that he wanted Finnick to try on, and then adjust to perfection. He had heard nothing but the sound of Damons voice for so long however that he was afraid that the next time he spoke it may come out in a Capitol accent.

So Finnick did as instructed and turned around to look at himself in the mirror. And Damon was right, he did look good, but like he had thought before at the opening ceremonies, his good looks were making this pretty easy for Damon. Finnick found that he was wearing a suit (surprise, surprise), but the suit had a bit of a super spy look to it. It was accented with bits and pieces of royal blue fabric around the cuffs and neck, however, to give it some life. He noticed once again, too, that Damon had left him with Ravens necklace.

And speaking of Raven, that was another reason why Finnick was so excited for tonight. This was the first time that her, or anyone back home for that matter, would have seen him since the Opening Ceremonies. He wondered if she had noticed him wearing the necklace. He decided to adjust it, to make it a little more noticeable, but Damon caught sight of him and yelled,

"Oh! That's it!" and rushed over to him, unbuttoning the first three buttons of the tux. "There! I've been wondering all week as to how I could put the finishing touches on the whole provocative angle, and there we go! Finnick my child, you're a _genius!_ If you win, you should consider fashion designing as a talent!"

_Over my dead body, _Finnick couldn't help but think. Damon had almost given him a heart attack when he had yelled, but he supposed it was all for the best. He didn't have to adjust the necklace now, because you could see it clearly. So with his costume finally done, Damon escorted Finnick from the room he was preparing in and away into the stage.

He lined up behind Ravine once Damon showed him where to go, and craned his neck to the side to try and get a better look at the rest of the tributes ahead of him. When he first arrived, Ravine, who was wearing a blue dress that was somewhat see through and hugged her curves tightly turned around and gave him an approving look. He noticed that ahead of her the boy from here was wearing a grey suit, while the girl was wearing a flashy silver one. It didn't suit her in the slightest. Orchid was in a purple dress with her dark hair in curls around her shoulders, and Denver was in a pastel blue suit with his hair in spikes. He looked good, but like a child. Topaz was wearing something that Finnick couldn't quite figure out. She was beautiful like always, but her dress had a pink tint to it, and had see-through sleeves. There were also openings in the side of her dress to show off her curves and the rest of the dress hugged her tightly to her mid thighs. Finnick could hear Ravine mutter behind him when she saw Topaz,

'_Skank__…'_

Just then, a Capitol attendant had them get into the proper line and led them out onto the stage where they sat in a row behind the interview area. Once they were all seated, Ceaser Flickerman, the Capitols favorite host, strutted out onto the stage bringing the crowd into an uproar. He waved at hem and blew them kisses, but rang them all in eventually. He then started calling up all the tributes in the order of their Districts to do there interviews. He started with Topaz, who happily sat across from Ceaser on the stage. He asked her how she was feeling going into the games, and she expressed a somewhat surprising (and disturbing) lust for blood, all the while flirting with Ceaser whenever she could. She left the crowd in a frenzy by the time her three minutes were up.

Next up was Pluto, who went on about all of the different ways he planned to kill people, which kept the crowd going. Finnick could see when he peeked at the other tributes that Melody, the twelve year old from 10, had her hand over her ears, which was a little bit heartbreaking. Pluto was definitely a crowd favorite this year.

When Orchid went up, she winked at Finnick, but he could only manage to give her a less than enthusiastic smile. Ceaser asked her how she felt about having the lowest training score of the careers but she waved him off,

"I was holding back in training Ceaser. I thought that I had to to avoid making the others look weak, but it would appear I held back maybe a little too much." She tried to tell him sincerely. The rest of her interview was a blur of sarcastic and witty comments. Then it was Denver's turn. From what Finnick could guess from his interview, he was trying to appear menacing and Ceaser played along, but the crowd wasn't fooled at all. Finnick tuned out the interviews from three, and next thing he knew it was Ravines turn.

All Finnick had to say that if Topaz had been trying to appear sexy, Ravine blew her out of the water. She flirted openly with the crowd and they seemed to fall more in love with her every time she spoke. By the time it was Finnicks turn the crowd was back on their feet, screaming and shouting applause.

So Finnick sat down in his chair across from Ceaser, who started by asking him how he liked he Capitol. Finnick knew that this was no time for honesty, so he replied, "It's the best Ceaser! It's a very beautiful place." While he said it, he scanned the front row of the crowd where a line of girls (and one guy) were sitting, and they all swooned. He smirked.

"Why yes, it is a very beautiful place, and what's been your favorite thing so far?" Finnick was sorely tempted to say 'the women' but be figured that may be going a little too far, so he settled with,

"The training center here is so much nicer than the one at home; the weapons are a lot nicer."

"I see, so I'll take it you're a career tribute?"

"Why yes Ceaser, I very much am." He answered, feeling a bit bad about himself. He heard Orchid giggle excitedly from where she was sitting and smirked. The rest of the interview went smoothly, Finnick dropping just enough flirtatious comments to keep the crowd going insane, and just before the interview was over Ceaser asked him one last question.

"So, Finnick, I've noticed that in all of the pictures we've seen so far of you in the Capitol, you've been wearing the same necklace that you are now. Is it what you're wearing as a token?" Finnick froze. He wasn't sure why, but he didn't want them to know about it. He didn't want them to know about her.

"Um, ya it is." He answered trying to keep cool. He was panicking. Why was he panicking?

"So might, I ask, is there a special someone back home who gave it to you?" Finnick was still panicking. He barely got out his last answer while keeping his voice steady,

"It was.. It was just a friend!" He finished. Ceaser looked at him suspiciously, but before he could speak again the buzzer went and Finnick sat back down. Ravine gave him a funny look but didn't say anything.

Finnick tuned out the rest of the interviews, except for a few. He noticed that the boy from six ranted on about how he was sure the games were all a hoax, ad that they were just for show. He also seemed to not like his District Partner very much, who name was Lillia and seemed to be a quiet girl who was humble and didn't say too much. She was clearly nervous about tomorrow.

The girl from District seven also stood out, not because she had a good interview however. Quite the opposite in fact. She stuttered a lot, and looked like she was going to be sick for most of the interview. He felt sort of bad, but it was also kind of funny. Her name was Alexa.

Then he noticed the pair from ten. The male, Ashton, was clearly unstable however tried to play it off as likeable. He was a large boy, very big of about seventeen. Then he noticed little Melody and he felt a pain in his heart. It really wasn't fair.

The last ones he noticed were the girl from eleven and the pair from twelve. The girl from eleven, whose name he learned was Cassie, was the one that he almost hit with a trident on the first day of training, who chose the likeable and funny angle. She was very pretty as well. She even made the crowd laugh a few times. The two from twelve were brother and sister, which would be awful.

The interview concluded successfully, and Finnick wandered off of the stage behind Ravine, and they crowded into the same elevator as the tributes from District 1, but when they got out of the elevator, Ravine turned to him and asked him,

'Who gave you that necklace? I saw you panic when he asked you. Why? Did you _steal_ it?" she smirked at him.

"I told you, it was just a friend. She gave it to me at the goodbyes." He tried to reply while avoiding the question, but he hadn't been careful enough.

"Oh so it's a girl!" she shrieked excitedly. "Oh but if she's just a _friend,_ so you wouldn't want the Capitol to know that the illustrious Finnick Odair couldn't keep a girl! Ha! Oh yes Finnick, whether you die or not, I'm very glad to have met you. You make me laugh!" And with that they arrived at their floor and the doors opened, Ravine ran off.

'_shit'_ Finnick thought to himself as he stepped off the elevator. He wished she hadn't run off so fast, because he was fairly certain that he could have concocted a lie that wasn't so damaging to his pride. But then two words rang in his head for some reason,

'_ran off…'_

And it was right then how Finnick knew he would deal with this Career issue he was having. He sprited to his room to start thinking about it, and once he had everything in his head ran back to find Desmond befor he left for the Victor Building to explain him his plan. Desmond was hesitant but Finnick was sure. It was the first time in a long time he had been sure…

**+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+**

**|Raven|**

Raven couldn't exactly describe what she felt when she turned off the interviews to go for a walk. She was very excited that Finnick had handled his interview so well, but she was also a little nervous about the way that he had said he was most definitely a career. Hadn't she told him not to let the games change him? That pissed her off. But she also felt a surge of pride whenever she saw him wearing that necklace of hers. She smiled to herself as she sat on her father's dock and let the warm breeze blow her hair back. But all of a sudden, she heard someone walking out along the dock towards her. She turned her head and looked back at a boy who looked vaguely familiar,

'Hello?' She asked him warily. Why did she feel like she knew this kid?

'Hi!' he replied smiling, 'I'm Geoff! And you are…?'

'Raven…' He smirked when she told him her name.

'What? Is my name amusing to you?' she snapped at him.

'No but it's a little ironic that you're blonde, right?' He looked at her. He had black hair all in his face and he had green eyes like Finnick, but they were dark and not as captivating. 'You're one of Finnicks friend right?' And that was how she knew him. He was one of Finnicks friends before she had met him.

'Ya, I guess so. Aren't you the guy that Finnick threw a vase at after the reaping?' She was positive it had been him.

'Oh, ya, well I may have said something stupid…' he answered smirking,

'Like what?' she answered playfully. It was sort of nice having someone new to talk to,

'I told him that moping wasn't going to get him to come back, and that really pissed him, I supposed he was stressed though..' He put his head down bashfully. Raven stood up,

'Well, I guess. Either way, it was okay talking to you' she told him and walked away. She could tell that that was probably not what he told Finnick at the reaping, but didn't particularly want to question about it. So she walked home and snuck in the house, considering it was late. Although Raven was not a religious person in the slightest, she found herself praying to whatever god that there may be wherever that tomorrow Finnick would be okay. Raven didn't have many friends, and wasn't particularly keen on losing one. So she fell asleep that night wondering, and praying that everything would be okay.

**+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+o-o+**

**Okay, okay, sue me because that was a shitty ending. I actually only threw the religion thing in there because I needed a speedy way to end that chapter. I promise I'll try really hard to post another one soon but I won't make any promises come the month of June, exams and whatnot :P Either way, I can assure you however that reviews are a big boost to the confidence and may encourage me to update faster (WINK, WINK!) ;) Alors, adieux and until next time…**

**~LinneaPike**

**PS:: Dont think that I would forget about what Geoff told Finnick at the goodbyes... Muahahah I hate him but I love him!**


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